A  BOOK  FOR  THE  TIMES : 

To  exterminate  Political  Vermin  and  Moral  Quacks. 


FROM  THE 


OF 


AUGUSTE  COMTE; 


"  Comte  fully  sees  the  cause  of  our  intellectual  anarchy,  and 
also  sees  the  cure.  —  LEWES'S  Biog.  Hist,  of  Philosophy. 

"  By  including  social  science  in  the  scientific  hierarchy, 
the  positive  spirit  admits  to  success  in  this  study  only  well- 
prepared  and  disciplined  minds,  so  trained  in  the  preceding 
departments  of  knowledge  as  to  be  fit  for  the  complex  prob 
lems  of  the  last.  The  long  and  difficult  preliminary  elabora 
tion  must  disgust  and  deter  vulgar  and  ill-prepared  minds, 
and  subdue  the  most  rebellious.  This  consideration,  if  there 
were  no  other,  would  prove  the  eminently  organic  tendency 
of  the  new  political  philosophy. — Positive  Philosophy  p.  434. 


NEW  YORK : 
PUBLISHED  BY  CALVIN  BLANCHARD, 

76  NASSAU  STREET. 


1856. 

Price  25  Cents. 


Library 

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SOCIAL  PHISII1S. 


CHAPTER  I. 

NECESSITY  AND  OPPORTUNENESS  OP  THIS  NEW  SCIENCE. 

IN  the  five  first  books  of  the  Positive  Philosophy,  our  investigation  pro 
ceeded  on  an  ascertained  and  undisputed  scientific  basis ;  and  our 
business  was  to  exhibit  the  progress  made  in  each  science ;  to  free 
it  from  entanglement  with  the  ancient  philosophy ;  and  to  show 
what  further  improvements  might  be  anticipated.  Our  task  is  a 
different,  and  a  much  harder  one,  in  the  case  of  the  sixth  and  last 
science  that  I  am  about  to  treat  of.  The  theories  of  Social  science 
are  still,  even  in  the  minds  of  the  best  thinkers,  completely  impli 
cated  with  the  theologico-metaphysical  philosophy ;  and  are  even 
-supposed  to  be,  by  a  fatal  separation  from  all  other  science,  con 
demned  to  remain  so  involved  for  erer.  The  philosophical  proce 
dure  which  I  have  undertaken  to  carry  through  becomes  more 
difficult  and  bold,  from  this  point  onward,  without  at  all  changing 
Its  nature  or  object ;  and  it  must  eo  far  present  a  new  character  as 
it  must  henceforth  be  employed  in  creating  a  wholly  new  order  of 
•scientific  conceptions,  instead  of  judging,  arranging,  and  improving 
•each  as  already  existed. 

It  is  not  to  be  expected  that  this  new  science  can  be  at  once 
raised  to  a  level  with  even  the  most  imperfect  of  those  which  we 
have  been  reviewing.  All  that  can  be  rationally  proposed  in  our 
day  is  to  recognise  the  character  of  positivity  in  social  as  in  all 
other  science,  and  to  ascertain  the  chief  bases  on  which  it  is 
founded  ;  but  this  is  enough,  as  I  hope  to  show,  to  satisfy  our  most 
urgent  intellectual  necessities,  and  even  the  most  imperative  needs 
of  immediate  social  practice.  In  its  scientific  connection  with  the 
rest  of  this  work,  all  that  I  can  hope  to  do  is  to  exhibit  the  general 
considerations  of  the  case,  so  as  to  resolve  the  intellectual  anarchy 
which  is  the  main  source  of  our  moral  anarchy  first,  Proposnl  of  the 
and  then  of  the  political,  which  I  shall  treat  of  only  subject 
through  its  originating  causes.  The  extreme  novelty  of  such  a  doc 
trine  and  method  renders  it  necessary,  before  entering  upon  the 


400  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

immediate  subject  to  set  forth  the  importance  of  such  a  procedure, 
and  the  futility  of  the  chief  attempts  which  have  been  indirectly 
made  to  investigate  social  science.  However  unquestionable  may 
be  the  need  of  such  science ;  and  the  obligation  to  discover  it,  the 
best  minds  have  not  yet  attained  a  point  of  view  from  which  they 
can  estimate  its  depth  and  breadth  and  true  position.  In  its  nas 
cent  state  every  science  is  implicated  with  its  corresponding  art ; 
and  remains  implicated  with  it,  as  we  have  seen,  the  longer  in 
proportion  to  the  complexity  of  the  phenomena  concerned.  If  bio 
logical  science  which  is  more  advanced  than  social,  is  still  too 
closely  connected  with  the  medical  art,  as  we  have  seen  that  it  is, 
we  can  not  be  surprised  that  men  are  insensible  to  the  value  of  all 
social  speculations  which  are  not  immediately  connected  with  prac 
tical  affairs.  We  can  not  be  surprised  at  any  obstinacy  in  repelling 
them,  as  long  as  it  is  supposed  that  by  rejecting  them,  society  is 
preserved  from  chimerical  and  mischievous  schemes :  though  expe 
rience  has  abundantly  shown  that  the  precaution  has  never  availed, 
and  that  it  does  not  now  prevent  our  being  daily  invaded  by  the 
most  illusory  proposals  on  social  matters.  It  is  in  deference,  as 
much  as  is  reasonable,  to  this  apprehension  that  I  propose  to  state, 
first,  how  the  institution  of  a  science  of  Social  Physics  bears  upon 
the  principal  needs  and  grievances  of  society,  in  its  present  deplora 
ble  state  of  anarchy.  Such  a  representation  may  perhaps  convince 
men  worthy  of  the  name  of  statesmen  that  there  is  a  real  and  emi 
nent  utility  in  labors  of  this  kind,  worthy  of  the  anxious  attention 
of  men  who  profess  to  devote  themselves  to  the  task  of  resolving 
the  alarming  revolutionary  constitution  of  modern  societies. 

From  the  point  of  view  to  which  we  have  been  raised  by  our 
study  of  the  preceding  sciences,  we  are  able  to  survey  the  social 
situation  of  our  own  time  in  its  fullest  extent  and  broadest  light ; 
and  what  we  see  is  that  there  is  a  deep  and  widely-spread  anarchy 
of  the  whole  intellectual  system,  which  has  been  in  this  state  of 
disturbance  during  the  long  interregnum,  resulting  from  the  de 
cline  of  the  theologico-metaphysical  philosophy.  At  the  present 
time,  the  old  philosophy  is  iu  a  state  of  imbecility ;  while  the 
development  of  the  positive  philosophy,  though  always  proceeding, 
has  not  yet  been  bold,  broad,  and  general  enough  to  comprehend 
the  mental  government  of  the  human  race.  /We  must  go  back 
through  that  interregnum  to  understand  truly  the  present  floating 
and  contradictory  state  of  all  great  social  ideas,  and  to  perceive  how 
society  is  to  be  delivered  from  the  peril  of  dissolution,  and  brought 
under  a  new  organization,  more  consistent  and  more  progressive 
than  that  which  once  rested  on  the  theological  philoso^^/  When 
we  have  duly  observed  the  powerlessness  of  conflicting  political 
schools,  we  shall  see  the  necessity  of  introducing  an  entirely  new 
spirit  into  the  organization  of  society,  by  which  these  useless  and 
passionate  struggles  may  be  put  an  end  to,  and  society  led  out  of 
the  revolutionary  state  in  which  it  has  been  tossed  about  for  three 
centuries  past. 


CONDITIONS   OF   ORDER   AND   PROGRESS.  401 

/     The  ancients  used  to  suppose  Order  and  Progress  to 

1     •  -ill  i      .LI       ,i  •      T  IT  T,.  ro!](Ktion<ofO- 

oe  irreconcilable  :  but  both  are  indispensable  conditions  <ier  and  in.g- 
in  a  state  of  modern  civilization  ;  and  their  combination  ' 
is  at  once  the, grand  difficulty  and  the  main  resource  of  every  genu 
ine  political  system.  No  real  order  can  be  established,  and  still 
less  can  it  last,  if  it  is  not  fully  compatible  with  progress :  and  no 
great  progress  can  be  accomplished  if  it  does  not  tend  to  the  con 
solidation  of  order.  Any  conception  which  is  so  devoted  to  one  of 
these  needs  as  to  prejudice  the  other,  is  sure  of  rejection,  sooner  or 
later,  as  mistaking  the  nature  of  the  political  problem.  Therefore, 

I  in  positive  social  science,  the  chief  feature  must  be  the  union  of 
these  two  conditions,  which  will  be  two  aspects,  constant  and  in 
separable,  of  the  same  principle.  Throughout  the  whole  range  of 
science,  thus  far,  we  have  seen  that  the  conditions  of  comblhation 
and  of  progress  are  originally  identical :  and  I  trust  we  shall  see, 
after  looking  into  social  science  in  the  same  way,  that  ideas  of  Or 
der  and  Progress  are  in  Social  Physics,  as  rigorously  inseparable 
as  the  ideas  of  Organization  and  Life  in  Biology ;  from  whence  in- 

I  deed  they  are,  in  a  scientific  view,  evidently  derived. 

^—  The  misfortune  of  our  actual  state  is  that  the  two  ideas  are  set 
up  in  radical  opposition  to  each  other — the  retrograde  spirit  having 
directed  all  efforts  in  favor  of  Order,  and  anarchical  doctrine  hav 
ing  arrogated  to  itself  the  charge  of  Social  Progress ;  and,  in  this 
state  of  things,  the  reproaches  exchanged  between  the  respective 
parties  are  only  too  well  merited  by  both.  In  this  vicious  circle  is 
society  now  confined  ;  and  the  only  issue  from  it  is  by  the  undispu 
ted  preponderance  of  a  doctrine  equally  progressive  and  hierarchi 
cal.  The  observations  which  I  have  to  make  on  this  subject  are 
applicable  to  all  European  societies,  which  have,  in  fact,  all  under 
gone  a  common  disorganization,  though  in  different  degrees,  and 
with  various  modifications,  and  which  can  not  be  separately  reorgan 
ized,  however  they  may  be  for  a  time  restrained ;  but  I  shall  keep 
the  French  nation  chiefly  in  view,  not  only  because  the  revolution 
ary  state  has  been  most  conspicuous  in  them,  but  because  they  are, 
in  all  important  respects,  better  prepared,  in  spite  of  appearances, 
than  any  other,  for  a  true  reorganization. 

Among  the  infinite  variety  of  political  ideas  which  appear  to  be 
striving  in  society,  there  are  in  fact  only  two  orders,  the  mingling 
of  which  in  various  proportions  occasions  the  apparent  multiplicity  : 
and  of  these  two,  the  one  is  really  only  the  negation  of  the  other. 
If  we  wish  to  understand  our  own  condition,  we  must  look  at  it  as 
the  result  and  last  term  of  the  general  conflict  undertaken,  for 
three  centuries  past,  for  the  gradual  demolition  of  the  old  political 
system.  So  regarding  it,  we  see  that  whereas,  for  above  half  a 
century,  the  irremediable  decay  of  the  old  system  has  proved  the 
necessity  of  founding  a  new  one,  we  have  not  been  sufficiently  aware 
of  the  need  to  have  formed  an  original  and  direct  conception,  ade 
quate  to  the  purpose  ;  so  that  our  theoretical  ideas  have  remained 
inferior  to  our  practical  necessities,  which,  in  a  healthv  state  of  the 

28 


102  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

social  organism,  they  habitually  anticipate,  to  prepare  for  their  reg 
ular  and  peaceable  satisfaction.  Though  the  political  movement 
could  not  but  have  changed  its  nature,  from  that  time  forward,  be 
coming  organic  instead  of  critical,  yet,  for  want  of  a  basis  in  sci 
ence,  it  has  proceeded  on  the  same  old  ideas  that  had  actuated  the 
past  struggle ;  and  we  have  witnessed  the  spectacle  of  defenders 
and  assailants  alike  endeavoring  to  convert  their  old  weapons  of 
war  into  instruments  of  reorganization,  without  suspecting  the  in 
evitable  failure  which  must  ensue  to  both  parties.  Such  is  the  state  "~^ 
that  we  find  ourselves  in  now.  All  ideas  of  order  in  the  political  y 
world  are  derived  from  the  old  doctrine  of  the  theological  and  mili 
tary  system,  regarded  especially  in  its  catholic  and  feudal  constitu 
tion  :  a  doctrine  which  from  our  point  of  view  in  this  work,  repre 
sents  the  theological  state  of  social  science :  and,  in  the  same  way, 
all  ideas  of  progress  are  still  derived  from  the  purely  negative  phi 
losophy  which,  issuing  from  protestantism,  assumed  its  final  form 
and  development  in  the  last  century,  and  which,  applied  to  social 
affairs,  constitutes  the  metaphysical  state  of  politics.  The  different 
classes  of  society  range  themselves  on  the  one  side  or  the  other,  ac^ 
cording  to  their  inclination  for  conservatism  or  amelioration.  With 
every  new  uprising  of  a  social  difficulty,  we  see  the  retrograde 
school  proposing,  as  the  only  certain  and  universal  remedy,  the  res 
toration  of  the  corresponding  part  of  the  old  political  system  ;  and 
the  critical  school  referring  the  evil  exclusively  to  the  destruction 
of  the  old  system  not  being  complete.  We  do  not  often  see  the 
two  doctrines  presented  without  modification.  They  so  exist  only 
in  purely  speculative  minds.  But  when  we  see  them  in  monstrous 
alliance,  as  we  do  in  all  degrees  of  political  opinion,  we  can  not  but 
know  that  such  an  alliance  can  not  yield  any  virtue  which  its  ele 
ments  do  not  contain,  and  that  it  can  only  exhibit  their  mutual 
neutralization.  We  must  here,  it  is  clear,  regard  the  theological 
and  the  metaphysical  politics  separately,  in  the  first  place,  that  we 
may  afterward  understand  their  present  antagonism,  and  form  an 
estimate  of  the  futile  combinations  into  which  men  have  endeavored 
to  force  them. 

Th(1  theological  Pernicious  as  the  theological  polity  may  be  in  our 
Polity.  (3av?  no  true  philosopher  will  ever  forget  that  it  afforded 

the  beneficent  guardianship  under  which  the  formation  and  earliest 
development  of  modern  societies  took  place.  But  it  is  equally  in 
contestable  that,  for  three  centuries  past,  its  influence  among  the 
most  advanced  nations,  has  been  essentially  retrograde,  notwith 
standing  some  partial  services.  We  need  not  go  into  any  discussion 
of  its  doctrine,  in  order  to  ascertain  its  poweiiessness  for  future 
service :  for  it  is  plain  that  a  polity  that  could  not  hold  its  ground 
before  the  natural  progress  of  intelligence  and  of  society  can  never 
again  serve  as  a  basis  of  social  order.  The  historical  analysis 
which  I  shall  have  to  offer  of  the  causes  that  have  dissolved  the 
Catholic  and  feudal  system  will  show,  better  than  any  argument,  how 
radical  and  irretrievable  is  the  decay.  The  theological  school  ex 


THE   THEOLOGICAL   POLITY.  403 

plains  the  fact,  as  far  as  it  can,  by  fortuitous  and,  we  might  almost 
^ay,  personal  causes :  and  when  they  will  no  longer  suffice,  resorts 
to  its  common  supposition,  of  a  mysterious  caprice  of  Providence 
which  has  allotted  to  social  order  a  season  of  probation,  of  which 
no  account  can  be  given,  either  as  to  its  date  or  its  duration,  or  even 
its  character.  A  contemplation  of  historical  facts  however  shows  that 
all  the  great  successive  modifications  of  the  theological  and  military 
system  have,  from  the  beginning  and  increasingly,  tended  to  the 
complete  elimination  of  a  regime  which,  by  the  fundamental  law  of 
social  evolution,  could  never  be  more  than  provisional,  however  in 
dispensable.  And  if  any  efforts  to  restore  the  system  could  achieve 
a  temporary  success,  they  would  not  bring  back  society  to  a  nor 
mal  state,  but  would  merely  restore  the  very  situation  which  com 
pelled  the  revolutionary  crisis,  by  obliging  it  to  set  about  the  work 
of  destruction  again,  with  more  violence,  because,  the  regime  has 
altogether  ceased  to  be  compatible  with  progress  in  the  most  essen 
tial  respects.  While  avoiding  all  controversy  on  so  plain  a  case,  I 
must  briefly  present  a  new  view  which  appears  to  me  to  point  out 
the  simplest  and  surest  criterion  of  the  value  of  any  social  doctrine, 
and  which  emphatically  condemns  the  theological  polity. 

Regarded  from  the  logical  point  of  view,  the  prob-  Criterion  of  so- 
leni  of  our  social  reorganization  seems  to  me  reduci-  ci!l1  doc*rine. 
ble  to  this  one  condition :  to  construct  rationally  a  political  doctrine 
which,  in  the  whole  of  its  active  development,  shall  be  always  fully 
'^consequent  on  its  own  principles.  No  existing  doctrines  approach 
to  a  fulfilment  of  this  condition :  all  contain,  as  indispensable  ele 
ments,  numerous  and  direct  contradictions  on  the  greater  number 
of  important  points.  It  may  be  laid  down  as  a  principle  that  the 
doctrine  which  furnishes  accordant  solutions  on  the  various  leading 
questions  of  polity,  without  failing  in  this  one  respect  in  the  course 
of  application,  must,  by  this  indirect  test  alone,  be  recognised  as 
sufficiently  adapted  to  reorganize  society ;  since  this  intellectual  re 
organization  must  mainly  consist  in  re-establishing  harmony  in  the 
troubled  system  of  our  social  ideas.  When  such  a  regeneration 
shall  have  been  accomplished  in  an  individual  mind  (and  in  that 
way  it  must  begin),  its  generalization,  sooner  or  later,  is  secure  ; 
for  the  number  of  minds  can  not  increase  the  difficulty  of  the  intel 
lectual  convergence,  but  only  defer  the  success.  We  shall  hereafter 
find  how  great  is  the  superiority  of  the  positive  philosophy  in  this 
view  ;  because,  once  extended  to  social  phenomena,  it  must  connect 
the  different  orders  of  human  ideas  more  completely  than  could  be 
done  in  any  other  way. 

The  accomplishment  of  this  great  logical  condition  FHilurfi  of  tho  the. 
might  be  expected  from  the  theological  polity  above  all  ol°sicsi1  p()lir>T 
others,  because  its  doctrine  is  limited  to  co-ordinating  a  system  so 
clearly  defined  by  its  long  application,  and  so  fully  developed  in 
all  its  essential  parts,  that  it  may  well  be  supposed  secure  from  all 
serious  inconsistency.  The  retrograde  school  accordingly  extols 
habitually,  as  its  characteristic  attribute,  the  perfect  coherence  of 


404  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

its  ideas,  in  contrast  with  the  contradictions  of  the  revolutionary 
school.  Yet,  though  the  theological  polity  Js  less  inconsistent  than 
the  metaphysical,  it  shows  a  daily  increasing  tendency  to  concessions 
of  the  most  radical  importance,  directly  contrary  to  all  its  essential 
principles.  This  is  evidence  enough  of  the  futility  of  a  doctrine 
which  does  not  even  possess  the  one  quality  most  spontaneously  cor 
respondent  to  its  nature.  The  old  political  system  is  seen  to  be 
destroyed  as  soon  as  its  most  devoted  adherents  have  lost  the  true 
general  sentiment  of  it :  and  this  may  now  be  observed,  not  only 
in  active  practice,  but  among  purely  speculative  minds  of  a  high 
order,  which  are  unconsciously  modified  by  the  irresistible  influences 
of  their  age.  If  examples  are  desired,  we  need  only  bring  the 
retrograde  doctrine  into  comparison  with  the  elements  of  modern 
civilization.  There  can  be  no  doubt  that  the  development  of  the 
sciences,  of  industry,  and  even  of  the  tine  arts,  was  historically  the 
pr^ftcipal,  though  latent  cause,  in  the  first  instance,  of  the  irretriev 
able  decline  of  the  theological  and  military  system.  At  present,  it 
is  the  ascendency  of  the  scientific  spirit  which  preserves  us  from 
any  real  restoration  of  the  theological  spirit ;  as,  again,  the  indus 
trial  spirit,  in  its  perpetual  extension,  constitutes  our  best  safeguard 

U  a  gainst  any  serious  recurrence   of  the  military  or  feudal  spirit. 

v  '\\tliatever  may  be  the  names  given  to  our  political  struggles,  this  is 
the  real  character  of  our  social  antagonism.  Now,  amidst  this  state 
of  things,  do  we  hear  of  such  a  thing  as  any  government,  or  even 
any  school,  seriously  proposing  a  systematic  repression  of  science, 
industry,  and  art  ?  Do  not  all  powers  (with  an  eccentric  exception 
here  and  there)  claim  the  honor  of  encouraging  their  progress  ? 
Here  we  have  the  first  inconsistency  of  the  retrograde  polity,  an 
nulling  its  own  project  of  a  restoration  of  the  past :  and  though 
the  inconsistency  is  less  apparent  than  some  others,  it  must  be  re 
garded  as  the  most  decisive  of  all,  because  it  is  more  universal  and 
more  instinctive  than  any  other.  Napoleon  Bonaparte  himself,  the 
hero  of  retrogression  in  our  time,  set  himself  up,  in  all  sincerity, 
as  the  protector  of  industry,  art,  and  science.  Purely  speculative 
minds,  though  more  easily  separating  themselves  from  any  prevalent 
tendency,  have  escaped  no  better  from  the  influence  of  their  times, 
How  many  have  been  the  attempts,  for  instance,  for  two  centuries 
past,  on  the  part  of  some  of  the  most  eminent  minds,  to  subordinate 
reason  to  faith,  according  to  the  theological  formula ;  reason  itself 
being  made  the  supreme  judge  of  such  a  submission,  and  thus  evi 
dencing  the  contradictory  character  of  the  proposition !  The  most 
eminent  thinker  of  the  Catholic  school,  the  illustrious  De  Maistre, 
bore  involuntary  testimony  to  the  necessity  of  his  time  when  he  en 
deavored,  in  his  principal  work,  to  re-establish  the  papal  supremacy 
on  historical  and  political  reasonings,  instead  of  ordaining  it  by 
divine  right,  which  is  the  only  ground  appropriate  to  such  a  doc 
trine,  and  the  only  ground  he  would  have  proposed  in  any  age  but 
one  in  which  the  general  state  of  intelligence  precluded  such  a 
plea.  Instances  like  these  may  spare  us  further  illustration. 


FATAL   DIVISIONS.  405 

As  for  more  direct  inconsistencies,  more  striking,  though  less 
profound,  and  comprehended  within  the  present  times,  wo  see  in 
every  sect  of  the  retrograde  school  a  direct  opposition  to  some  fun 
damental  part  of  their  common  doctrine.  Perhaps  the  only  point  on 
which  there  is  now  any  unanimity  in  that  school  is  in  the  consent 
to  break  up  the  very  basis  of  the  catholic  and  feudal  system,  by  I 
surrendering  the  division  between  the  spiritual  and  temporal  power  ; 
or,  what  comes  to  the  same  thing,  acquiescing  in  the  subordination 
of  the  spiritual  to  the  temporal  authority.  In  this  respect,  the  kings 
are  showing  themselves  as  revolutionary  as  their  peoples ;  and  the 
priests  have  ratified  their  own  degradation,  in  catholic  countries 
no  less  than  protestant.  If  their  desire  is  to  restore  the  old 
system,  their  first  step  must  be  to  unite  the  innumerable  sects  which 
have  sprung  out  of  the  decline  of  Christianity ;  but  every  attempt 
of  the  sort  has  failed  through  the  blind  and  obstinate  determina 
tion  of  the  governments  to  retain  the  supreme  direction  of  the 
theological  power,  the  centralization  of  which  they  thus  render  im 
possible.  Napoleon,  only  showed  an  exaggerated  copy,  in  his  violent 
inconsistencies,  of  what  many  princes  had  done  before  him :  and 
after  his  fall,  when  the  sovereigns  of  Europe  united  to  set  up  a 
power  in  opposition  to  revolutionary  tendencies,  they  usurped  the 
attributes  of  the  old  spiritual  authority,  and  exhibited  the  spectacle 
of  a  high  council  composed  of  heretic  chiefs,  and  governed  by  a 
schismatic  prince.  After  this  it  was  manifestly  impossible  to  intro 
duce  the  papal  power  into  the  alliance,  in  any  way  whatever.  Such 
instances  of  the  postponement  of  religious  principles  to  temporal 
convenience  are  not  new  ;  but  they  show  how  the  main  idea  of  the 
old  political  system  has  ceased  to  preponderate  in  the  minds  of 
the  very  persons  who  undertook  to  restore  it.  The  divisions  in  the 
retrograde  school  have  been  of  late  apparent  under  all  circumstances, 
whether  of  success  or  defeat.  Any  temporary  success  ought  to 
rally  all  dissentients,  in  a  school  which  boasts  of  the  unity  of  its 
doctrine :  yet,  through  a  long  course  of  years  we  have  witnessed 
successive,  and  more  and  more  serious  schisms  among  the  subdivis 
ions  of  the  triumphant  party.  The  advocates  of  Catholicism  and 
those  of  feudality  have  quarrelled :  and  the  latter  have  split  into 
partisans  of  aristocracy  and  defenders  of  royalty.  Under  the  com- 
pletest  restored  supremacy,  the  schisms  would  only  break  out  again, 
with  more  violence,  through  the  incompatibility  of  the  existing  social 
state  with  the  old  political  system.  The  vague  assent  to.  its  gen 
eral  principles  which  is  yielded  in  a  speculative  sense,  must  give 
way  in  their  application  ;  and  every  practical  development  must 
engender  further  divisions :  and  this  is  the  scientific  description  of 
any  theory  which  is  incompatible  with  the  facts. 

When  the  retrograde  party  is  reduced  to  the  rank  of  an  opposi 
tion,  it  has  recourse  to  the  principles  of  the  revolutionary  doctrine. 
This  has  been  the  case  repeatedly  during  the  last  three  centuries, 
when  that  party  has  been  put  upon  the  defensive.  Thus  we  see 
the  Catholics  in  England,  and  yet  more  in  Ireland,  asserting  the 


406  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

3laim  of  liberty  of  conscience,  while  still  clamoring  for  the  repres 
sion  of  Protestantism  in  France,  Austria,  and  else\vhere.  Again, 
when  the  sovereigns  of  Europe  invoked  the  aid  of  the  peoples  to 
put  down  Napoleon,  they  surrendered  their  retrograde  doctrine, 
and  testified  to  the  power  of  the  critical,  as  that  which  was  really 
influencing  civilized  society,  even  though  they  were  proposing,  all 
the  while,  to  effect  the  restoration  of  the  ancient  polity.  We  have 
seen  something  even  more  wonderful  since  that  struggle.  We  have 
seen  the  retrograde  party  taking  possession  of  the  whole  body  of 
critical  doctrine,  endeavoring  to  systematize  it  for  its  own  uses, 
and  sanctioning  all  its  anarchical  consequences ;  trying  to  set  up 
the  catholic  and  feudal  regime  by  the  very  means  which  have  de 
stroyed  it ;  and  believing  that  a  mere  change  in  the  person  of  the 
sovereign  would  intercept  the  consequences  of  a  political  move 
ment  which  they  had  done  nothing  to  modify.*  This  is  simply  a 
new  way  of  signing  a  political  abdication,  however  the  ability  of 
those  who  do  it  may  be  extolled. — We  need  not  look  further  for 
illustrations  of  the  pregnant  fact  that  a  polity  which  is  the  type  of 
unity  and  permanence  has  been  full  of  schisms,  and  now  contains 
elements  directly  incompatible  with  its  fundamental  principles  ;  and 
that,  as  when  we  find  De  Maistre  reproaching  Bossuet  with  mista 
king  the  nature  of  Catholicism,  and  then  himself  falling  into  incon 
sistencies,  the  party  of  Order  is  proposing  to  re-establish  that  which 
is  not  comprehended  by  its  most  illustrious  defenders. 
The  Metaphy.i-  Turning  now  to  the  Metaphysical  polity,  we  must 
cai  polity.  fast  observe  and  carefully  .remember  that  its  doctrine, 
though  exclusively  critical,  and  therefore  revolutionary,  has  still 
always  had  the  virtue  of  being  progressive,  having,  in  fact,  super 
intended  the  chief  political  progress  accomplished  during  the  last 
three  centuries,  which  must  be,  in  the  first  instance,  essentially 
negative.  What  this  doctrine  had  to  do  was  to  break  up  a  system 
•:  which,  having  directed  the  early  growth  of  the  human  mind  and 
society,  tended  to  protract  that  infantile  period :  and  thus,  the 
political  triumph  of  the  metaphysical  school  was  a  necessary  prep 
aration  for  the  advent  of  the  positive  school,  for  which  the  task  is 
exclusively  reserved  of  terminating  the  revolutionary  period  by  the 
formation  of  a  system  uniting  Order  with  progress.  Though  the 
metaphysical  system,  considered  by  itself,  presents  a  character  of 
direct  anarchy,  an  historical  view  of  it,  such  as  we  shall  take  here 
after,  shows  that,  considered  in  its  origin,  and  in  its  antagonism  to 
the  old  system,  it  constitutes  a  necessary  provisional  state,  and 
must  be  dangerously  active  till  the  new  political  organization  which 
is  to  succeed  it  is  ready  to  put  an  end  to  its  agitations. 

The  passage  from  one  social  system  to  another  can  never  be  con 
tinuous  and  direct.  There  is  always  a  transitional  state  of  anarchy 
which  lasts  for  some  generations  at  least ;  and  lasts  the  longer  the 
more  complete  is  the  renovation  to  be  wrought.  The  best  political 

*  Tins  was  written   during   the   reign  of  Louis  Philippe,  and  the  administration,  of  M 


Gruizot 


THE   METAPHYSICAL   POLITY.  407 

progress  that  can  be  made  during  such  a  period  is  in  gradually 
demolishing  the  former  system,  the  foundations  of  which  had  been 
sapped  before.      While  this  inevitable  process  is  going  on,  the 
elements  of  the  new  system  are  taking  form  as  political  institu 
tions,  and  the  reorganization  is  stimulated  by  the  experience  of  the 
evils  of  anarchy.     There  is  another  reason  why  the  constitution  of 
the  new  system  can  not  take  place  before  the  destruction  of  the 
old ;  that  without  that  destruction  no  adequate  conception  could  be 
formed  of  what  must  be  done.     Short  as  is  our  life,  and  feeble  as 
is  our  reason,  we  can  not  emancipate  ourselves  from  the  influence 
of  our  environment.     Even  the  wildest  dreamers  reflect  in   their 
dreams  the  contemporary  social  state :  and  much  more  impossible 
is  it  to  form  a  conception  of  a  true  political  system,  radically  dif 
ferent  from  that  amidst  which  we  live.     The  highest  order  of  minds 
can  not  discern  the  characteristics  of  the  coming  period  till  they 
are  close  upon  it ;    and  before  that,  the  incrustations  of  the  old 
system  will  have  been  pretty  much  broken  away,  and  the  popular 
mind  will  have  been  used  to  the  spectacle  of  its  demolition.     The 
strongest  head  of  all  antiquity  is  an  example  of  this.     Aristotle 
could  not  conceive  of  a  state  of  society  that  was  not  founded  on 
slavery,  the  irrevocable  abolition  of  which  took  place  some  cen 
turies  after  him. — Those  considerations  are  illustrative  of  our  own 
times,  for  which  all  former  transition  periods  were  merely  a  prep 
aration.     Never  before  was  the  destined  renovation  so  extensive 
and   so  thorough ;    and  never  before,  therefore,  was  the  critical 
preparatory  period  so  protracted  and  so  perilous.     For  the  first 
time  in  the  history  of  the  world,  the  revolutionary  action  is  at 
tached  to  a  complete  doctrine  of  methodical  negation  of  all  regular 
government.     Such  being  the  origin  of  the  existing  critical  doc 
trine,  we  can  explain  the  services  which  that  doctrine  has  hitherto 
rendered,  and  the  obstacles  which  it  now  opposes  to  the  reorganiza 
tion  of  modern  society.     We  shall  see  hereafter  how  each  of  its 
principal  dogmas  has  sprung  out  of  some  corresponding  decay  in 
the  old  social  order ;  a  decay  which  then  proceeded  all  the  faster 
for  the  opposition  having  become  a  dogma.     The  misfortune  of  the 
case  lies  in  the  doctrine  which  was  thus  necessarily  relative  to  the 
old  system  coming  by  degrees  to  be  supposed  absolute  ;  but  we  may 
leave  it  to  those  who  desire  it  to  blame  the  political  conduct  of  our 
fathers,  without  whose  energetic  perseverance  we  should  not  have 
found  ourselves  at  our  present  stage  of  progress,  or  have  been  able 
to  conceive  of  the  better  polity  that  is  approaching.     The  absolute 
or  metaphysical  spirit  was  necessary  to  direct  the  formation  of  the 
critical   and  anti-theological  doctrine,  which  needed  all  possible 
energy  to  overthrow  the  great  ancient  system ;  and  this  energy 
could  no  otherwise  be  imparted  to  the  dogmas  of  the  critical  phi 
losophy.      The   necessity  and  the  fact  of   the   case  are  obvious 
enough :  but  not  the  less  must  we  deplore  the  consequence, — that 
the  energy  imparted  to  the  anarchical  principle  has  gone  on  to  im 
pede  the  institution  of  the  very  political  order  for  which  it  came  to 


408  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

prepare  the  way.  When,  in  the  natural  course  of  events,  any  doc 
trine  has  become  hostile  to  the  purposes  it  was  destined  to  serve, 
it  is  evidently  done  with ;  and  its  end,  or  the  close  of  its  activity, 
is  near.  We  have  seen  that  the  retrograde  or  theological  polity 
has  become  as  disturbing  as  the  metaphysical  or  revolutionary :  if 
we  find  also  that  the  latter,  whose  office  was  to  aid  progress,  has 
become  obstructive,  it  is  clear  that  both  doctrines  are  worn  out, 
and  must  soon  be  replaced  by  a  new  philosophy. — This  condition 
of  the  metaphysical  polity  is  a  nfatter  so  serious  that  we  must  dwell 
upon  it  a  little,  to  see  how  so  provisional  an  influence  can  have 
produced  the  appearance  of  a  new  and  stable  system. 

The  spirit  of  revolutionary  polity  is  to  erect  into  a  permanency 
the  temporary  action  which  it  prompts.  For  instance,  being  in 
antagonism  with  ancient  order,  its  tendency  is  to  represent  all  gov- 
Brrom^ob-  eminent  as  being  the  enemy  of  society,  and  the  duty  of 
society  to  be  to  keep  up  a  perpetual  suspicion  and  vigi 
lance,  restricting  the  activity  of  government  more  and  more,  in 
order  to  guard  against  its  encroachments,  so  as  to  reduce  it  at 
length  to  mere  functions  of  police,  in  no  way  participating  in  the 
supreme  direction  of  collective  action  and  social  development. 
This  was  the  inevitable  action  by  which  the  social  evolution  was 
brought  about :  and  it  is  our  misfortune  that  it  now  remains  as  an 
obstacle  to  the  reorganization  that  we  need.  As  the  process  could 
not  but  occupy  several  centuries,  the  power  that  wrought  it  must 
needs  be  invested  with  something  definitive  and  absolute  in  the 
popular  view,  which  can  not  look  far  beyond  the  present :  and  it 
was  well  that  it  was  so  ;  for  the  old  system  could  not  have  been 
deprived  of  its  directing  powers,  if  they  had  not  been  stripped  off 
from  the  governments,  and  assumed  by  the  polity  which  had  arisen 
to  supersede  them. 

j>oemac>fib.Tty  Regarding  the  doctrine  in  a  more  special  view,  it  is 
of  conscience.  clear  that  its  most  important  principle  is  the  right  of 
free  inquiry,  or  the  dogma  of  unbounded  liberty  of  conscience ; 
involving  the  immediate  consequences  of  the  liberty  of  the  press,  or 
of  any  other  mode  of  expression,  and  of  communication  of  opinions. 
This  is  the  rallying-point  of  the  revolutionary  doctrine,  to  which 
all  orders  of  minds  have  come  up, — the  proud  and  the  humble,  the 
wise  and  the  weak, — those  whose  other  opinions  were  compatible 
with  this  dogma,  and  those  who  unconsciously  held  views  of  an 
opposite  order.  The  impulse  of  this  emancipation  Avas  irresistible  ; 
and  the  revolutionary  contagion  was,  in  this  one  respect,  universal. 
It  is  a  chief  characteristic  of  the  mind  of  society  in  this  century. 
The  most  zealous  partisans  of  the  theological  polity  are  as  apt  as 
their  adversaries  to  judge  by  their  personal  knoAvledge  ;  and  those 
who,  in  their  writings,  set  up  as  defenders  of  spiritual  government, 
recognise,  like  the  revolutionists  whom  they  attack,  no  other  su 
preme  authority  than  that  of  their  own  reason.  Now  if  we  look  at 
what  is  the  real  meaning  of  this  dogma  of  the  universal  and  abso 
lute  right  of  inquiry,  we  shall  find  that  it  is  the  mere  abstract  ex- 


DOGMA    OF   LIBERTY   OF   CONSCIENCE.  409 

pression  (such  as  is  common  in  metaphysics)  of  the  temporary 
state  of  unbounded  liberty  in  which  the  human  mind  was  left  by 
the  decay  of  the  theological  philosophy,  and  which  must  last  till  the 
social  advent  of  the  positive  philosophy.  Such  an  embodiment  of 
the  fact  of  the  absence  of  intellectual  regulation  powerfully  con 
curred  in  expediting  the  dissolution  of  the  old  system.  The  for 
mula  could  not  but  appear  absolute  at  the  time,  because  no  one 
could  foresee  the  scope  of  the  transitional  state  which  it  marked ; 
a  state  which  is  even  now  mistaken  by  many  enlightened  minds  for 
a  definitive  one.  Negative  as  we  now  see  this  dogma  to  be",  signi 
fying  release  from  old  authority  while  waiting  for  the  necessity  of 
positive  science  (a  necessity  which  already  pats  liberty  of  con 
science  out  of  the  question  in  astronomy  and  physics,  etc.)  the 
absolute  character  supposed  to  reside  in  it  gave  it  energy  to  fulfil 
its  revolutionary  destination ;  enabled  philosophers  to  explore  the 
principles  of  a  new  organization  ;  and,  by  admitting  the  right  of  all 
to  a  similar  research,  encouraged  the  discussion  which  must  pre 
cede  and  effect  the  triumph  of  those  principles.  Whenever  those 
principles  shall  have  become  established,  the  right  of  free  inquiry 
will  abide  within  its  natural  and  permanent  limits :  that  is,  men 
will  discuss,  under  appropriate  intellectual  conditions,  the  real  con 
nection  of  various  consequences  with  fundamental  rules  uniformly 
respected.  Till  then,  the  opinions  which  will  hereafter  bring  un 
derstandings  into  submission  to  an  exact  continuous  discipline  by 
embodying  the  principles  of  the  new  social  order  can  appear  only 
as  simple  individual  thoughts,  produced  in  virtue  of  the  right  o*f 
free  inquiry ;  since  their  final  supremacy  can  result  in  no  other 
way  than  from  the  voluntary  assent  of  numbers,  after  the  freest  dis 
cussion.  I  shall  enter  further  into  this  subject  hereafter :  and  what 
I  have  said  will,  I  hope,  prevent  any  one  being  shocked  by  my 
general  appreciation  of  the  revolutionary  dogma  of  free  inquiry,  as 
it  is  plain  that  without  it  this  book  would  never  have  been  written. 
Indispensable  and  salutary  as  it  has  been,  this  dogma  can  never 
be  an  organic  principle :  and,  moreover,  it  constitutes  an  obstacle 
to  reorganization,  now  that  its  activity  is  no  longer  absorbed  by  the 
demolition  of  the  old  political  order.  In  any  case,  private  or  pub 
lic, 'the  state  of  inquiry  can  evidently  be  only  provisional,  indicating 
the  condition  of  mind  which  precedes  and  prepares  for  a  final 
decision,  toward  which  our  reason  is  always  tending,  even  when  it 
is  renouncing  old  principles,  in  order  to  form  new  ones.  It  is 
taking  the  exception  for  the  rule  when  we  set  up,  as  a  natural  and 
Dermanent  state,  the  precarious  situation  which  belongs  to  the  pe 
riod  of  transition  ;  and  we  ignore  the  deepest  necessities  of  human 
reason  when  we  would  protract  that  skepticism  which  is  produced 
by  the  passage  from  one  mode  of  belief  to  another,  and  which  is, 
in  our  need  of  fixed  points  of  conviction,  a  kind  of  morbid  pertur 
bation  which  can  not  be  prolonged  beyond  the  corresponding  crisis 
without  serious  danger.  To  be  always  examining  and  never  de 
ciding  would  be  regarded  as  something  like  madness  in  private 


410  POSITIVE  PHILOSOPHY. 

conduct :  and  no  dogmatic  consecration  of  such  conduct  in  all  indi 
viduals  could  constitute  any  perfection  of  social  order,  with  regard 
to  ideas  which  it  is  much  more  essential,  and  much  more  difficult  to 
establish  beyond  the  reach  of  dispute.  There  are  very  few  persons 
who  consider  themselves  fit  to  sit  in  judgment  on  the  astronomical, 
physical,  and  chemical  ideas  which  are  destined  to  enter  into  social 
circulation  ;  and  everybody  is  willing  that  those  ideas  should  direct 
corresponding  operations  ;  and  here  we  see  the  beginnings  of  intel 
lectual  government.  Can  it  be  supposed  that  the  most  important 
and  the  most  delicate  conceptions,  and  those  which  by  their  com 
plexity  are  accessible  to  only  a  small  number  of  highly-prepared 
understandings,  arc  to  be  abandoned  to  the  arbitrary  and  variable 
decisions  of  the  least  competent  minds  ?  If  such  an  anomaly  could 
be  imagined  permanent,  a  dissolution  of  the  social  state  must  ensue, 
through  the  ever-growing  divergence  of  individual  understandings, 
delivered  over  to  their  disorderly  natural  impulses  in  the  most 
vague  and  easily-perverted  of  all  orders  of  ideas.  The  speculative 
inertia  common  to  most  minds,  and  perhaps,  to  a  certain  extent,  the 
wise  reserve  of  popular  good  sense,  tend,  no  doubt,  to  restrict  such 
political  aberrations  :  but  these  are  influences  too  feeble  to  root  out 
the  pretension  of  every  man  to  set  himself  up  as  a  sovereign  arbi 
ter  of  social  theories ; — a  pretension  which  every  intelligent  man 
blames  in  others,  with  a  reservation,  more  or  less  explicit,  of  his 
own  personal  competency.  Now  the  intellectual  reorganization  can 
not  proceed  amidst  such  a  state  of  things,  because  the  convergeac.e 
of  minds  requires  the  renunciation  by  the  greater  number  of  their 
right  of  individual  inquiry  on  subjects  above  their  qualifications, 
and  requiring,  more  than  any  others,  a  real  and  permanent  agree 
ment.  Then  again,  the  unbridled  ambition  of  ill-prepared  intel 
lects  rushes  in  among  the  most  complex  and  obscure  questions  : 
and  these  disturbances,  though  they  must  finally  neutralize  each 
other,  make  terrible  devastation  in  the  interval ;  and  each  one  that 
is  destroyed  makes  way  for  another ;  so  that  the  issue  of  these 
controversies  is  a  perpetual  aggravation  of  the  intellectual  anarchy. 
No  association  whatever,  even  of  the  smallest  number  of  individu 
als,  and  for  the  most  temporary  objects,  can  subsist  without  a  cer 
tain  degree  of  reciprocal  confidence,  intellectual  and  moral,  among 
its  members,  each  one  of  whom  has  incessantly  to  act  upon  views 
which  he  must  admit  on  the  faith  of  some  one  else.  If  it  is  so  in 
this  limited  case,  there  is  something  monstrous  in  proposing  the 
opposite  procedure  in  the  case  of  the  whole  human  race,  each  one 
of  whom  is  at  an  extreme  distance  from  the  collective  point  of 
view,  and  is  the  last  person  of  the  whole  number  fit  to  judge  of  the 
rules  by  which  his  personal  action  should  be  directed.  Be  the  in 
tellectual  development  of  each  arid  all  what  it  may,  social  order 
must  ever  be  incompatible  with  a  perpetual  discussion  of  the 
foundations  of  society.  Systematic  toleration  can  exist  only  with 
regard  to  opinions  which  are  considered  indifferent  or  doubtful,  as 
we  see  in  that  aspect  of  the  rev  >lutionary  spirit  which  takes  it? 


DOGMA    OF   EQUALITY.  411 

stand  on  Protestantism,  where  the  innumerable  Christian  sects  arc 
too  weak  to  pretend  to  spiritual  dominion,  but  where  there  is  as 
fierce  an  intolerance  about  any  common  point  of  doctrine  or  dis 
cipline  as  in  the  Romish  Church  itself.  And  when  the  critical  doc 
trine  was,  at  the  beginning  of  the  French  Revolution,  supposed  to 
be  organic,  we  know  how  the  directors  of  the  movement  strove  to 
obtain  a  general  assent,  voluntary  or  forced,  to  the  dogmas  of  the 
revolutionary  philosophy,  which  they  regarded  as  the  bases  of  social 
order,  and  therefore  above  controversy,  We  shall  see  hereafter 
what  are  the  due  limits  of  the  right  of  free  inquiry,  in  a  general 
way,  and  in  regard  to  our  own  social  period.  It  is  enough  to  ob 
serve  here  that  political  good  sense  has  adopted,  to  express  the 
first  requisite  of  all  organization,  that  fine  axiom  of  the  Catholic 
Church :  in  necessary  things,  unity:  in  doubtful  things,  liberty:  in 
all  things,  charity :  a  maxim  which  admirably  proposes  the  prob 
lem,  without,  however,  suggesting  the  principles  by  which  it  must 
be  solved,  and  that  unity  attained  which  would  be  a  mere  illusion 
if  it  did  not  result,  in  the  first  instance,  from  free  discussion. 

The  dogma  which  ranks  next  in  importance  to  that  Dogma  of  EquaT] 
of  free  inquiry  is  that  of  Equality ;  and  in  the  same  ^° 
way,  it  is  taken  to  be  absolute  when  it  is  only  relative,  and  perma 
nent,  while  it  expresses  merely  the  position  of  minds  employed  in 
breaking  up  the  old  system.  It  is  an  immediate  consequence  of 
liberty  of  conscience,  which  brings  after  it  the  most  fundamental 
equality  of  all, — that  of  intelligence.  The  supposition  of  its  being 
absolute  was  not  less  necessary  in  this  case  than  the  former :  for, 
if  all  social  classification  had  not  been  systematically  disallowed., 
the  old  corporations  would  have  preserved  their  sway,  from  the 
impossibility  of  their  conceiving  of  any  other  classification.  To 
this  day  we  have  no  sufficiently  distinct  notion  ourselves  of  such 
an  arrangement  as  would  be  truly  appropriate  to  a  new  state  of 
civilization. 

When  the  dogma  of  equality  had  achieved  the  overthrow  of  the  old 
polities,  it  could  not  but  become  an  obstacle  to  any  reorganization, 
because  its  activity  must  then  be  directed  against  the  bases  of  any 
new  classification  whatever ;  for,  of  course,  any  classification  must 
be  incompatible  with  the  equality  that  was  claimed  for  all.  Since 
the  abolition  of  slavery,  there  has  been  no  denial,  from  any  quarter, 
of  the  right  of  every  man  (innocent  of  strong  anti-social  conduct)  to 
expect  from  all  others  the  fulfilment  of  the  conditions  necessary  to 
the  natural  development  of  his  personal  activity,  suitably  directed : 
but,  beyond  that  undisputed  right,  men  can  not  be  made,  because 
they  are  not,  equal,  nor  even  equivalent ;  and  they  can  not  there 
fore  possess,  in  a  state  of  association,  any  identical  rights  beyond 
the  great  original  one.  The  simple  physical  inequalities  which  fix 
the  attention  of  superficial  observers  are  much  less  marked  than 
intellectual  and  moral  differences  ;  and  the  progress  of  civilization 
tends  to  increase  these  more  important  differences,  as  much  as  to 
lessen  the  inferior  kind :  and,  applied  to  any  assemblage  of  per- 


412  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

sons  thus  developed,  the  dogma  of  equality  becomes  anarchical, 
and  directly  hostile  to  its  original  destination. 

The  second  result  of  the  dogma  of  liberty  of  con- 

Do<*ma     of    the          .  -in  •  n     i 

sovereignty  of  science  is  the  {sovereignty  oi  the  people  i  and,  like  the 
former,  it  wrought  at  first  the  double  service  of  destroy 
ing  the  old  regime  and  preparing  for  a  new  one.  Till  the  final 
system  could  be  constituted,  the  only  safeguard  against  the  renewed 
supremacy  of  the  old  one  was  in  the  setting  up  of  provisional  insti 
tutions,  which  the  peoples  claimed  the  absolute  right  to  change  at 
will.  It  was  only  by  means  of  the  doctrine  of  popular  sovereignty 
that  that  succession  of  political  endeavors  could  take  place  which 
must  precede  the  installation  of  a  true  system  of  government,  when 
ever  the  intellectual  renovation  of  society  shall  be  sufficiently 
advanced  to  settle  the  conditions  and  natural  extent  of  the  different 
sovereignties.  Meanwhile,  in  discharging  its  function,  this  dogma 
proves  its  revolutionary  character  before  our  eyes,  by  opposing  all 
reorganization,  condemning,  as  it  does,  all  the  superior  to  an  arbi 
trary  dependence  on  the  multitude  of  the  inferior,  by  a  kind  of 
transference  to  the  peoples  of  the  divine  right  which  had  become  the 
opprobium  of  kings. 

Do-ma  of  Na        ^Q  reY°lutionary  spirit  of  the  critical  doctrine  man- 

domai  jnd.  pend.  ifests  itself  no  less  clearly  when  we  look  at  international 

relations.     The  necessity  of  ordei*  being  in  this  case 

more  equivocal  and  obscure,  the  absence  of  all  regulating  power 

/lias  been  more  ingenuously  declared  than  in  other  cases.  When  the 
ancient  spiritual  power  was  politically  annulled,  the  dissolution  of 
European  order  followed  spontaneously  from  the  principle  of  liberty 
of  conscience  ;  and  the  most  natural  papal  function  was  at  an  end. 
Till  the  new  social  organization  shall  show  us  the  law  by  which  the 
nations  shall  become  once  more  connected,  the  metaphysical  no 
tions-  of  national  isolation,  and  therefore  of  mutual  non-intervention, 
must  prevail ;  and  they  will  be  regarded  as  absolute  till  it  appears 

\how  they  defeat  their  own  end.  As  all  attempts  at  European  co 
ordination  must  otherwise  be  directed  by  the  ancient  system,  we 
owe  to  the  doctrine  of  national  independence  our  rescue  from  the 
monstrous  arrangement  of  the  most  civilized  nations  being  politi 
cally  subordinated  to  the  least  advanced,  because  the  latter  were 
least  changed  from  their  ancient  state,  and  would  be  sure  therefore 
to  be  placed  at  the  head  of  such  an  association.  But,  if  such  a  doc 
trine  were  more  than  provisional,  the  nations  would  sink  below  their 
state  in  the  Middle  Ages ;  and  at  the  very  time  when  they  are 
marked  out,  by  an  ever-growing  resemblance,  for  an  association 
more  extensive,  and,  at  the  same  time  more  regular,  than  that  which 
was  proposed  by  the  old  catholic  and  feudal  system.  It  is  clear  that 
when  the  dogma  of  national  isolation  has  fulfilled  its  function  of 
separating  the  nations,  in  order  to  a  preparation  for  a  new  union,  its 
further  action  must  be  as  purely  anarchical  as  that  of  its  predecessors. 
A  brief  notice  of  the  logical  inconsistency  of  the  revolutionary 
doctrine  will  conclude  our  preliminary  review  of  it. 


INCONSISTENCY   OF   THE   METAPHYSICAL   DOCTRINE.  413 

This  inconsistency  is  more  radical  and  more  manifest 


than  in  the  case  of  the  retrograde  or  theological  doctrine  ;  *»&*  j 
but  it  does  not  imply  so  utter  a  condemnation  ;  not  only  doctrintj- 
on  account  of  its  recent  formation,  but  because  such  a  vice  does  not 

v_prevent  its  fulfilling  its  critical  office.  Notwithstanding  profound 
differences,  the  adversaries  of  the  old  polity  found  no  difficulty  in 
uniting  for  successive  partial  demolitions  about  which  they  were 
agreed,  postponing  till  their  period  of  success  their  contests  about 
the  ulterior  developments  of  their  doctrine  ;  a  course  which  would 
be  impossible  in  the  case  of  any  organic  operation,  in  which  each 
part  must  be  considered  in  its  relation  to  the  whole.  Thus  far 
only,  however,  can  the  inconsistency  be  tolerated.  When  once  the 
whole  of  any  doctrine  becomes  hostile  to  its  original  purposes,  it  is 
condemned  :  and  this  is  true  of  the  metaphysical  doctrine,  which  at 
once  opposes  the  progress  it  professed  to  aid,  and  sustains  the 
foundations  of  the  political  system  it  proposed  to  destroy. 

Its  culminating  point  was  at  the  most  marked  period  of  the 
first  French  Revolution,  when  it  was,  by  an  unavoidable  illusion, 
taken  to  be  the  principle  of  social  reorganization.  It  was  then  seen 
in  its  best  aspect  of  consistency  and  power  ;  and  then  it  was  that, 
the  ancient  system  being  disposed  of,  its  vices  became  apparent.  It 
showed  itself  hostile  to  all  social  reorganization,  and  became  actu 
ally  retrograde  in  its  character  by  setting  itself  up  in  violent  oppo 
sition  to  the  movement  of  modern  civilization.  For  one  illustration, 
look  at  the  strange  metaphysical  notion  of  a  supposed  NoHon  0fH«tat<> 
state  of  nature,  which  was  to  be  the  primitive  and  in-  ol  Nam™. 
variable  type  of  every  social  state.  This  doctrine  is  not  to  be 
attributed  to  Rousseau  alone.  It  is  that  of  all  philosophers,  in  all 
times  and  countries,  who  have  unconsciously  concurred  in  develop 
ing  the  revolutionary  metaphysical  doctrine  which  Rousseau,  by  his 
urgent  dialectics,  only  pushed  to  its  real  conclusions.  His  doctrine, 
which  represents  a  state  of  civilization  as  an  ever-growing  degen 
eracy  from  the  primitive  ideal  type,  is  common  to  all  modern  meta 
physicians  ;  and  we  shall  see  hereafter  that  it  is  only  the  metaphys 
ical  form  of  the  theological  dogma  of  the  degradation  of  the  human 
race  by  original  sin.  According  to  such  a  principle,  all  political  ref 
ormation  must  be  regarded  as  destined  to  re-establish  that  primitive 
state  :  and  what  is  that  but  organizing  a  universal  retrogradation, 
though  with  progressive  intentions  ?  The  applications  of  this  doc 
trine  have  been  in  conformity  to  its  philosophical  constitution. 
When  it  was  necessary  to  replace  the  feudal  and  catholic  regime, 
men  did  not  fix  their  contemplation  on  the  social  future,  but  sum 
moned  up  their  imperfect  remembrances  of  a  very  distant  past,  try 
ing  to  substitute  for  a  decrepit  system  a  more  ancient  and  decrepit 
system  still,  but,  for  that  very  reason,  nearer  to  the  primitive  type. 

,  Instead  of  a  wornout  Catholicism,  they  proposed  a  sort  of  meta 
physical  polytheism,  at  the  same  time  that,  in  polity,  they  desired 
to  replace  the  Middle  Age  system  by  the  radically  inferior  regime 
of  the  Greeks  and  Romans.  The  very  elements  of  modern  civil  iza- 


414  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

tion,  the  only  possible  germs  of  a  new  social  state,  were  endangered 
by  barbaric  condemnation  of  the  industrial  and  artistic  advancement 
of  modern  society,  in  the  name  of  primitive  virtue  and  simplicity. 
Even  the  scientific  spirit,  which  is  the§only  principle  of  intellectual 
organization,  was  stigmatized  as  tending  to  institute  an  aristocracy 
of  knowledge  which  was  as  incompatible  as  any  other  aristocracy 
with  the  original  equality  that  was  to  be  set  up  again.  Lavoisier 
was  the  martyr  of  this  state  of  opinion  ;  and  it  is  his  case  that  will 
illustrate  the  period  to  our  remotest  posterity.  It  is  useless  for  the 
metaphysical  school  to  represent  such  results  as  portentous  or 
eccentric  incidents.  Their  legitimate  descent  from  the  revolution 
ary  polity  is  evident  and  certain  ;  and  we  should  witness  a  repeti 
tion  of  them  if  it  were  possible  (which  it  is  not)  for  this  polity  to 
become  prevalent  again.  The  tendency  to  social  retrogradation, 
under  the  idea  of  returning  to  the  primitive  state,  so  thoroughly 
belongs  to  the  metaphysical  polity,  that  the  new  sects  who,  in  their 
brief  day,  have  most  haughtily  censured  the  revolutionary  imitation 
of  Greek  and  Roman  types,  have  unconsciously  reproduced  the 
same  error  in  a  far  more  marked  way  by  striving  to  re-establish  the 
confusion  between  the  temporal  and  spiritual  power,  and  extolling, 
as  the  highest  social  perfection,  a  return  to  the  Egyptian  or  He 
brew  theocracy,  founded  on  fetichism,  disguised  under  the  name  of 
pantheism. 

Adhes:on  to  the  As  the  metaphysical  doctrine  was  the  issue  of  the 
wom-out.  theological,  and  destined  to  modify  it,  it  was  a  matter 
of  course  that  it  should  vindicate  the  general  foundations  of  the  old 
system,  even  after  having  destroyed  its  chief  conditions  of  existence. 
Every  reformer,  for  three  centuries  past,  while  urging  the  develop 
ment  of  the  critical  spirit  further  than  his  predecessors,  assumed  to 
set  immutable  bounds  to  it ;  deriving  his  limitations  from  the  old 
system.  All  the  absolute  rights  proclaimed  as  the  basis  of  the  new 
doctrine  were  guarantied  by  a  sort  of  religious  consecration,  in  the 
last  resort ;  and  this  was  indispensable,  if  their  efficacy  was  not  to 
be  impaired  by  continual  discussion.  It  was  always  with  an  invo 
cation  of  the  principles  of  the  old  polity  on  their  lips  that  the  re 
formers  proceeded  to  demolish  the  spiritual  a.nd  temporal  institutions 
in  which  they  were  embodied  ;{ and  the  whole  regime  fell  through 
the  conflict  of  its  chief  elements)  Hence  there  arose,  in  the  intel 
lectual  region,  a  Christianity  mdre  and  more  attenuated  or  simpli 
fied,  and  reduced  at  last  to  that  vague  and  impotent  theism  which, 
^-fey:  a  monstrous  conjunction  of  terms,  metaphysicians  have  entitled 
Natural  Religion,  as  if  all  religion  were  not  necessarily  super 
natural.  The  pretension  to  direct  a  social  reorganization  by  this 
strange  conception  is  merely  a  recurrence  to  the  old  principle  that 
social  order  must  rest  on  a  theological  basis.  This  is  now  the  most 
fatal  inconsistency  of  the  revolutionary  school ;  and  while  armed 
with  such  a  concession,  the  advocates  of  Catholicism  will  always 
have  an  incontestable  logical  superiority  over  the  irrational  de- 
of  the  old  faith',  who  proclaim  the  need  of  a  religious  organ 


POLITICAL   CENTRALIZATION.  415 

ization,  and  yet  disallow  all  the  necessary  conditions.  It  is  clear 
that  society  would  be  condemned  to  a  perpetuity  of  the  intellectual 
anarchy  which  characterizes  it  at  present  if  it  were  to  be  for  ever  * 
made  up  of  minds  which  admit  the  want  of  a  theological  regime  on 
the  one  hand,  while,  on  the  other,  they  reject  its  principal  condi 
tions  of  existence ;  and  those  who  thus  acknowledge  themselves 
incapable  have  no  right  to  discredit  the  only  rational  way  to  re 
organization  which  remains  open,  and  by  which  every  other  order  of 
human  conceptions  has  been  happily  retrieved  and  established.  The 
social  application  of  the  positive  philosophy  remains  as  the  re 
source,  arid  the  only  resource,  after  the  failure  of  both  the  prece 
ding  systems. 

•  In  its  temporal  application  the  inconsistency  of  the  Rncilrrenc.  to 
I  metaphysical  doctrine  is  as  conspicuous  as  in  the  spir-  war- 
)  itual.  It  strives  to  preserve,  if  not  the  feudal,  at  least  the  military 
spirit,  in  which  the  feudal  had  its  origin.  The  French  nation  did, 
it  is  true,  in  their  revolutionary  enthusiasm,  proscribe  war  from 
that  time  forward :  but  when  the  armed  coalition  of  the  retrograde 
forces  of  Europe  brought  out  an  immense  amount  of  energy  for 
self-defence,  for  the  sake  of  the  progressive  movement,  the  senti 
ment,  which  was  grounded  on  no  principle,  soon  disappeared,  and 
France  was  distinguished  by  the  most  conspicuous  military  activity, 
invested  with  Us  most  oppressive  characteristics.  The  military  spirit 
is  in  fact  so  congenial  with  the  critical  doctrine  that  any  pretext 
will  serve  for  its  indulgence :  as  for  instance,  when  it  is  proposed  to 
regulate  by  war  the  action  of  the  more  advanced  nations  upon  the 
less  advanced.  The  true  logical  consequence  of  this  would  be  a 
universal  uproar;  but,  happily,  the  nature  of  modern  civilization 
eaves  us  from  the  danger.  The  tendency  of  the  critical  regime  in 
this  respect  is  shown  by  the  perpetual  endeavors  of  the  various 
sections  of  the  revolutionary  school  to  reinstate  the  memory  of  the 
man  who,  of  all  others,  strove  for  political  retrogradation,  by  wast- 
ing  enormous  amount  of  power  in  the  restoration  of  the  military 
and  theological  system. 

Before  quitting  the  subject  of  the  inconsistencies  of   . 

,,.  i        i     T  L     •      .  •      A»  •    j.  Principle  of  Fo- 

this  school,  I  must,  in  justice,  point  out  one  more  con-  Titicai  centraiiza- 
tradiction  which,  as  being  of  a  progressive  character,  twn- 
is  honorable  to  those  most  advanced  minds  which  entertain  it,  and 
which  alone  understand  its  necessity,  opposed  as  it  is  to  the  dogmas 
of  independence  and  isolation  which  constitute  the  spirit  of  the 
critical  school.     I  refer  to  the  principle  of  political  centralization. 
The  two  parties  seem  here  to  have  changed  sides.      The  retro-  \ 
grade  doctrine,  notwithstanding  its  proud  pretensions  to  order  and 
unity,  preaches  the  distribution  of  political  centres,  in  the  secret 
hope  of  preserving  the  old  system  yet  a  while  longer  among  the 
most  backward  of  the  populations,  by  keeping  them  aloof  from  the 
general  centres  of  civilization ;  while  the  revolutionary  policy,  on 
the  other  hand,  proud  of  having  withstood,  in  France,  the  coalition  , 
of  the  old  powers,  discards  its  own  maxims  to  recommend  the  sub/ 


116  POSITIVE  PHILOSOPHY. 

ordination  of  the  secondary  to  the  principal  centres  by  which  such 
a  noble  stand  has  already  been  made,  and  which  must  become  a 
most  valuable  auxiliary  of  reorganization.  Thus  alone  can  the  re 
organization  be,  in  the  first  place,  restricted  to  a  choice  population. 
In  brief,  the  revolutionary  school  alone  has  understood  that  the 
increasing  anarchy  of  the  time,  intellectual  and  moral,  requires,  to 
prevent  a  complete  dislocation  of  society,  a  growing  concentration 
of  political  action,  properly  so  called. 

Thus,  after  three  centuries,  employed  in  the  necessary  demolition 
;of  the  ancient  regime,  the  critical  doctrine  shows  itself  as  incapa 
ble  of  other  application,  and  as  inconsistent  as  we  have  now  seen 
it  to  be.  (it  is  no  more  fit  to  secure  Progress,  than  the  old  doctrine 
to  maintain  Order.  But,  feeble  as  they  are  apart,  they  actually 
sustain  each  other  by  their  very  antagonism,  It  is  universally 
understood  that  neither  can  ever  again  achieve  a  permanent  triumph : 
but,  so  strong  is  the  apprehension  of  even  the  temporary  prepon 
derance  of  either,  that  the  general  mind,  for  want  of  a  more  ra 
tional  point  of  support,  employs  each  doctrine  in  turn  to  restrain 
the  encroachments  of  the  other.  This  miserable  oscillation  of  our 
social  life  must  proceed  till  a  real  doctrine  as  truly  organic  as  pro 
gressive,  sjjall  reconcile  for  us  the  two  aspects  of  the  great  political 
problem.  (Then,  at  last,  the  two  opposite  doctrines  will  disappear 
for  ever  in  the  new  conception  that  will  be  seen  to  be  completely 
adapted  to  fulfil  the  destination  of  both.|  Often  has  each  party, 
blinded  by  some  temporary  success,  believed  that  it  had  annihilated 
the  other ;  and  never  has  the  event  failed  to  mock  the  ignorant 
exultation.  The  critical  doctrine  seemed  to  have  humbled  for  ever 
the  catholic-feudal  school ;  but  that  school  arose  again.  Napoleon 
thought  he  had  accomplished  a  retrograde  reaction ;  but  the  very 
energy  of  his  efforts  caused  a  reaction  in  favor  of  revolutionary 
principles.  And  thus  society  continues  to  vibrate  between  con 
flicting  influences ;  and  those  influences  continue  to  exist  only  by 
their  mutual  neutralization.  For  that  purpose  only,  indeed,  are 
they  now  ever  applied.  Neither  could  be  spared  before  the  advent 
of  the  state  which  is  to  succeed  them.  Without  the  one,  we  should 
lose  the  sentiment  of  Order,  and  without  the  other,  that  of  Prog- 
^ess ;  and  the  keeping  alive  this  sentiment,  on  either  hand,  is  the 
/  only  practical  efficacy  which  now  remains  to  them.  Feeble  as  the 
conception  must  be,  in  the  absence  of  any  principle  which  unites 
the  two  requisites,  it  is  preserved  by  the  presence  of  the  two  decay 
ing  systems  ;  and  they  keep  before  the  minds  of  both  philosophers 
and  the  public  the  true  conditions  of  social  reorganization,  which 
otherwise  our  feeble  nature  might  misconceive  or  lose  sight  of. 
Having  the  two  types  before  us,  we  see  the  solution  of  the  great 
problem  to  be,  to  form  a  doctrine  which  shall  be  more  organic  than 
the  theological,  and  more  progressive  than  the  metaphysical. 

The  old  political  system  can  be  no  pattern  for  a  regime  suitable 
to  a  widely  different  civilization ;  but  we  are  not  under  the  less 
obligation  to  study  it,  in  order  to  learn  what  are  the  essential  at- 


SOCIAL   OSCILLATIONS.  417 

tributes  of  all  social  organization,  which  must  reappear  in  an  im 
proved  state  in  the  future.  The  general  conception  of  the  theologi 
cal  and  military  system  even  seems  to  me  to  have  passed  too  much 
out  of  sight.  And,  as  to  the  Critical  system,  there  can  be  no  ques 
tion  of  its  affording,  by  its  progressive  character,  and  its  exposure 
of  the  preceding  ri-gime,  a  most  valuable  stimulus  to  society  to 
seek  for  something  better  than  mere  modifications  of  systems  that 
have  failed.  The  common  complaint  that  it  renders  all  government 
impossible,  is  a  mere  avowal  of  impotence  on  the  part  of  those 
who  utter  it.  Whatever  are  its  imperfections,  it  fulfilled  for  a  time 
one  of  the  two  requisities :  its  abolition  would  in  no  way  assist  the 
re-establishment  of  Order ;  and  no  declamations  against  the  revolu 
tionary  philosophy  will  affect  the  instinctive  attachment  of  society 
to  principles  which  have  directed  its  political  progress  for  three 
centuries  past,  and  which  are  believed  to  represent  the  indispensable 
conditions  of  its  future  development.  Each  of  its  dogmas  affords 
an  indication  of  how  the  improvement  is  to  be  effected.  Each  ex 
presses  the  political  aspect  of  certain  high  moral  obligations  which 
the  retrograde  school,  with  all  its  pretensions,  wUs  compelled  to 
ignore,  because  its  system  had  lost  all  power  to  fulfil  them.  In 
this  way,  the  dogma  of  Free  Inquiry  decides  that  the  spiritual  re 
organization  must  result  from  purely  intellectual  action,  providing 
for  a  final  voluntary  and  unanimous  disent,  without  the  disturbing 
intervention  of  any  heterogeneous  power.  Again,  the  dogmas  of 
Equality  and  the  Sovereignty  of  the  people  devolve  on  the  new 
powers  and  classes  of  society  the  duty  of  a  public-spirited  social 
conduct,  instead  of  working  the  many  for  the  interests  of  the  few. 
The  old  system  practised  these  moralities  in  its  best  days  ;  but  they 
are  now  maintained  only  by  the  revolutionary  doctrine,  which  it 
would  be  fatal  to  part  with  till  we  have  some  substitute  in  these 
particular  respects ;  for  the  effect  would  be  that  we  should  be 
delivered  over  to  the  dark  despotism  of  the  old  system ; — to  the 
restorers  of  religions,  for  instance,  who,  if  proselytism  failed,  would 
have  recourse  to  tyranny  to  compel  unity,  if  once  the  principle  of 
free  inquiry  were  lost  from  among  us. 

It  is  useless  to  declaim  against  the  critical  philosophy,  and  to 
deplore,  in  the  name  of  social  order,  the  dissolving  energy  of  the 
spirit  of  analysis  and  inquiry.  It  is  only  by  their  use  that  we  can 
obtain  materials  for  reorganization ;  materials  which  shall  have 
been  thoroughly  tested  by  free  discussion,  carried  on  till  general 
conviction  is  secured.  The  philosophy  which  will  arise  out  of  this 
satisfaction  of  the  public  reason  will  then  assign  the  rational  limits 
which  must  obviate  the  abuse  of  the  analytical  spirit,  by  establish 
iiag  that  distinction  in  social  matters,  between  the  field  of  reasoning 
and  that  of  pure  observation,  which  we  have  found  already  marked 
out  in  regard  to  every  other  kind  of  science. 

Though  consigned,  by  the  course  of  events,  to  a  negative  doctrine 
for  awhile,  society  has  never  renounced  the  laws  of  human  reason : 
and  when  the  proper  time  arrives,  society  will  use  the  rights  of  this 

27 


418  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

reason  to  organize  itself  anew,  on  principles  which  will  then  have 
been  ascertained  and  estimated.  The  existing  state  of  no-govern 
ment  seems  necessary  at  present,  in  order  to  that  ascertainment  of 
principles  ;  but  it  does  not  at  all  follow,  as  some  eccentric  individ 
uals  seem  to  think,  that  the  right  of  inquiry  imposes  the  duty  of 
never  deciding.  The  prolonged  indecision  proves  merely  that  the 
principles  which  are  to  close  the  deliberation  are  not  yet  sufficiently 
established.  In  the  same  way,  because  society  claims  the  right  of 
choosing  and  varying  its  institutions  and  governing  powers,  it  by 
no  means  follows  that  the  right  is  for  ever  to  be  used  in  choosing 
and  varying,  when  its  indefinite  use  shall  have  become  injurious. 
When  the  right  conditions  shall  have  been  ascertained,  society  will 
submit  its  choice  to  the  rules  which  will  secure  its  efficacy ;  and  in 
the  interval,  nothing  can  be  more  favorable  to  future  order  than  that 
the  political  course  should  be  kept  open,  to  admit  of  the  free  rise 
of  the  new  social  system.  As  it  happens,  the  peoples  have,  thus 
far,  erred  on  the  side  of  too  hasty  a  desire  for  reorganization,  and 
a  too  generous  confidence  in  every  promise  of  social  order,  instead 
of  having  shown  the  systematic  distrust  attributed  to  the  revolu 
tionary  doctrine  by  those  whose  wornout  claims  will  not  bear  dis 
cussion.  There  is  more  promise  of  political  reorganization  in  the- 
revolutionary  doctrine  than  in  the  retrograde,  though  it  is  the 
supreme  claim  of  the  latter  to  be  the  safeguard  of  social  Order. 
The  stationary  Such  is  the  vicious  circle  in  which  we  are  at  present 
doctrine.  confined.  We  have  seen  what  is  the  antagonism  of 

two  doctrines  that  are  powerless  apart,  and  have  no  operation  but 
in  neutralizing  each  other.  They  have  lost  their  activity  as  pre 
ponderating  influences,  and  are  seen  now  in  the  form  of  political 
debate,  which  they  daily  direct  by  the  one  furnishing  all  the  essen 
tial  ideas  of  government,  and  the  other  the  principles  of  opposition. 
At  shorter  and  shorter  intervals,  a  partial  and  transient  superiority 
is  allowed  to  the  one  or  the  other,  when  its  antagonist,  threatens 
danger.  Out  of  these  oscillations  a  third  opinion  has  arisen,  which 
is  constructed  out  of  their  ruins,  and  takes  its  station  between  them. 
I  suppose  we  must  give  the  name  of  Doctrine  to  this  intermediate 
opinion,  bastard  and  inconsistent  asis  its  character ;  for  it  is  presented 
by  very  earnest  doctors,  who  urge  it  upon  us  as  a  type  of  the  final 
political  philosophy.  We  must  call  it  the  Stationary  Doctrine ; 
and  we  see  it,  in  virtue  of  that  quality,  occupying  the  scene  of  poli 
tics,  among  the  most  advanced  people,  for  above  a  quarter  of  a 
century.  Essentially  provisional  as  it  is,  the  Stationary  school 
naturally  serves  as  a  guide  to  society  in  preserving  the  material 
order,  without  which  a  true  doctrine  could  not  have  its  free  growth. 
It  may  be  necessary  for  our  weakness  that  the  leaders  of  this  school 
should  suppose  that  they  have  a  doctrine  which  is  destined  to 
triumph ;  but  whatever  benefits  arise  from  their  action  are  much 
impaired  by  the  mistake  of  supposing  our  miserable  transition  state 
a  permanent  type  of  the  social  condition.  The  stationary  polity  not 
only  contains  inconsistencies,  but  it  is  itself  inconsistency  erected 


THE   STATIONARY   DOCTRINE.  410 

into  a  principle.  It  acknowledges  the  essential  principles  of  the 
other  systems,  but  prevents  their  action.  Disdainful  of  Utopias,  it 
proposes  the  wildest  of  them  all ; — that  of  fixing  society  for  ever  in 
a  contradictory  position  between  retrogradation  and  regeneration. 
The  theory  serves  to  keep  in  check  the  other  two  philosophies  ;  and 
this  may  be  a  good :  but,  on  the  other  hand,  it  helps  to  keep  them 
alive ;  and  it  is,  in  so  far,  an  obstacle  to  reorganization.  When  I 
present  my  historical  review  of  society,  I  shall  explain  the  special 
assemblage  of  social  conditions  which  gave  England  her  parliamen 
tary  monarchy,  so  laudect  by  the  school  of  mixed  doctrine,  but,  in 
fact,  an  exceptional  institution,  whose  inevitable  end  can  not  be 
very  far  off.  When  we  enter  upon  that  analysis,  we  shall  see  how 
great  is  the  error  of  philosophers  and  statesmen  when  they  have 
taken  up  a  singular  and  transient  case  as  the  solution  of  the  revolu 
tionary  crisis  of  modern  societies,  and  have  endeavored  to  trans 
plant  on  the  European  continent  a  purely  local  system,  which  would 
be  deprived  in  the  process  of  its  very  roots :  for  it  is  an  organized 
Protestantism  which  is  its  main  spiritual  basis  in  England.  The 
expectation  attached  to  this  single  specious  aspect  of  the  stationary 
doctrine  will  make  a  future  examination  of  it  important ;  and  we 
shall  then  see  how  hopeless  is  the  constitutional  metaphysics  of  the 
balance  of  powers,  judged  by  that  instance  which  serves  as  the  com 
mon  ground  of  such  social  fictions.  After  all  the  vast  efforts  made 
to  nationalize  elsewhere  the  stationary  compromise,  it  has  never  suc 
ceeded  anywhere  but  in  its  native  land ;  and  this  proves  its  power- 
lessness  in  regard  to  the  great  social  problem.  The  only  possible 
result  is  that  the  mischief  should  pass  from  the  acute  to  the  chronic 
state,  becoming  incurable  by  the  recognition  as  a  principle  of  the 
transient  antagonism  which  is  its  chief  symptom.  Its  principal 
merit  is  that  it  admits  the  double  aspect  of  the  social  problem,  and 
the  necessity  of  reconciling  Order  and  Progress :  but  it  introduces 
no  new  idea  ;  and  its  recognition  amounts  therefore  to  nothing  more 
than  an  equal  sacrifice,  when  necessary  of  the  one  and  the  other. 
The  order  that  it  protects  is  a  merely  material  order ;  and  it  there 
fore  fails  in  that  function  precisely  in  crises  when  it  is  most  wanted. 
On  the  other  hand,  this  function  continues  to  be  attributed  to  roy 
alty,  which  is  the  only  power  of  the  old  polity  that  is  still  active : 
now,  the  balance  which  is  instituted  by  the  stationary  doctrine  sur 
rounds  the  royal  power  with  bonds  that  are  always  tightening,  while 
declaring  that  royal  power  to  be  the  chief  basis  of  the  government. 
It  is  only  a  question  of  time  when  the  function  of  sovereignty,  thus 
embarrassed,  shall  cease,  and  the  pretended  balance  be  destroyed. 
This  parliamentary  polity  serves  the  cause  of  progress  no  better 
than  that  of  order :  for,  as  it  proposes  no  new  principle,  the  re 
straints  which  it  puts  upon  the  revolutionary  spirit  are  all'  derived 
from  the  ancient  system,  and  therefore  tend  to  become  more  and 
more  retrograde  and  oppressive.  An  example  of  this  is,  the  restric 
tions  on  the  right  of  election  ;  restrictions  always  derived  from  irra 
tional  material  conditions,  which,  being  arbitrary  in  their  character, 


420  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

oppress  and  irritate,  without  answering  their  proposed  purpose,  arid 
leave  the  multitude  of  the  excluded  much  more  offended  than  the 
small  number  of  the  privileged  are  gratified. 

There  is  no  need  to  say  more  in  this  place  of  the  mixed  or  Sta 
tionary  doctrine,  which  is,  in  fact,  only  a  last  phase  of  the  meta 
physical  polity.  The  reader  can  not  but  see  that  a  theory  so 
precarious  and  subaltern,  so  far  from  being  able  to  reorganize  mod 
ern  society,  can  only  regulate,  by  protracting,  the  political  conflict, 
and  discharge  the  negative  office  of  preventing  kings  from  retrogra 
ding  and  peoples  from  destroying.  Whatever  the  value  of  this  ser- 
'rice  may  be,  AVC  can  not  expect  regeneration  to  be  accomplished  by 
means  of  impediments. 

Dm^rs  ot  th -  We  nave  now  soei1  ^1C  worth  of  these  three  systems. 
critic-i|«?r:oi  To  complete  our  conviction  of  the  need  of  a  better,  we 
must  briefly  notice  the  chief  social  dangers  which  result  from  the 
deplorable  protraction  of  such  an  intellectual  condition,  and  which 
must,  from  their  nature,  be  aggravated  from  day  to  day.  The  dan 
gers  are  imputable  to  all  the  three  systems  ;  though  the  revolution 
ary  and  stationary  systems  assume  that  the  blame  of  our  disorders 
rests  with  the  retrograde  school :  but  they  are  certainly  no  less 
guilty  ;  for,  powerless  to  discover  the  remedy,  they  protract  the  mis 
chief  and  embarrass  the  treatment.  And  again,  the  discordance 
between  the  movement  of  governments  and  of  their  peoples  is  to  be 
attributed  quite  as  much  to  the  hostile  spirit  of  the  directing  power 
as  to  the  anarchical  tendency  of  popular  opinions.  The  social  per 
turbations,  the  aspects  of  which  we  are  about  to  examine,  proceed 
no  less  from  the  kings  than  from  their  peoples,  with  this  aggravated 
disgrace — that  it  seems  as  if  the  solution  ought  to  emanate  from  the 
kings. 

intellectual  an-  The  first,  the  most  fatal,  and  the  most  universal  con- 
"rci.y.  sequence  of  this  situation  is  the  alarming  and  ever- 

widening  extent  of  the  intellectual  anarchy  which  all  acknowledge, 
However  they  may  differ  about  its  cause  and  termination.  This 
evil  is  charged  almost  exclusively  on  the  revolutionary  philosophy ; 
and  that  school  too  readily  admits  the  charge.  But,  as  we  have 
seen,  that  doctrine  does  not  prohibit  decision,  when  the  requisite 
grounds  are  ascertained :  and  it  is  the  stationary  theory  that  ought 
to  bear  the  blame  of  the  absence  of  those  grounds :  and  yet  more 
the  retrograde,  which  is  chargeable  with  urging  the  restoration  of 
';he  same  wornout  principles  which,  by  their  decrepitude,  have 
caused  all  this  anarchy.  The  stationary  school  does  not  want  to 
hear  of  any  such  principles,  and  interdicts  them ;  and  the  retro 
grade  school  insists  that  the  old  ones  will  do  over  again.  So  that, 
if  the  revolutionary  school  first  encouraged  the  anarchy,  the  other 
two  protract  it. 

Of  all  questions,  there  are  none  which  have  so  much  claim  as 
social  problems  to  be  consigned  to  a  small  number  of  choice  minds 
which  shall  have  been  prepared  by  a  high  order  of  discipline  and 
instruction  for  the  investigation  of  questions  so  complex  and  so 


EXISTING   ANARCHY.  421 

mixed  up  with  human  passions.  Such  is,  at  least,  the  natural  state 
of  the  human  mind,  in  contrast  with  which  its  condition  in  revolu 
tionary  periods  may  be  regarded  as,  in  a  manner,  pathological,  how- 
Qver  inevitable.  The  social  malady  must  be  very  serious  when  we 
see  all  manner  of  persons,  however  inferior  their  intelligence,  and 
however  unprepared,  stimulated,  in  the  highest  manner,  and  from 
day  to  day,  to  cut  the  knot  of  the  most  intricate  political  questions, 
without  any  guidance  or  restraint.  The  wonder  is,  not  that  the 
divergence;  of  opinion  is  what  it  is,  but  that  any  points  of  agreement 
at  all  are  left  amid  all  this  dissolution  of  social  maxims.  The  evil 
has  reached  such  a  point  that  all  political  opinions,  though  of  course 
derived  from  one  of  the  three  schools,  differ  through  so  many  de 
grees  as  to  become  individual ;  through  all  degrees,  in  fact,  that  the 
combination  of  three  orders  of  vicious  principles  admits  of.  Except 
on  occasion  of  emergency,  when  there  is  a  temporary  coalition 
(amid  which  each  one  usually  hopes  to  have  his  own  way)  it  be 
comes  more  and  more  difficult  to  make  even  a  very  small  number 
of  minds  adhere  to  a  plain  and  explicit  profession  of  political  faith. 
This  inability  to  co-operate  prevails  in  all  the  three  camps — as  we 
ought  carefully  to  observe :  and  each  party  has  often,  in  its  ingenu 
ous  moments,  bitterly  deplored  the  intense  disagreement  with  which 
it  supposed  itself  to  be  especially  afflicted ;  whereas,  the  others 
were  no  better  organized ;  and  the  chief  difference  in  the  three 
cases  was  that  each  was  most  acutely  sensible  of  its  own  misery. 

In  countries  where  this  intellectual  anarchy  has  been  sanctioned 
by  the  political  preponderance  of  Protestantism,  the  divergences 
have  been  more  multiplied  than  elsewhere,  without  being  less 
serious.  It  could  not  but  be  so  from  the  tendency  of  the  general 
mind,  in  its  then  infantile  state,  to  use  its  new  emancipation  to  plunge 
into  the  indefinite  discussion  of  religious  opinions — (the  most  vague 
and  discordant  of  all) — in  the  absence  of  a  restraining  spiritual 
authority.  In  the  United  States,  for  instance,  there  are  hundreds 
of  Christian  sects,  radically  discordant,  and  incessantly  parting  off 
into  opinions  which  are  really  little  more  than  individual,  which  it 
is  impossible  to  classify,  and  which  are  already  becoming  implicated 
with  innumerable  political  differences.  The  nations  which,  like  the 
French,  have  escaped  the  treacherous  stage  of  Protestantism,  and 
have  passed  at  once  from  the  Catholic  to  the  fully  revolutionary 
state,  were  not,  on  that  account,  entirely  exempt  from  the  intellec 
tual  anarchy  inherent  in  any  prolonged  exercise  of  the  absolute 
right  of  free  individual  inquiry.  All  that  can  be  said  is  that  their 
aberrations,  without  being  less  anti-social,  have  a  less  vague  char 
acter,  and  are  less  in  the  way  of  the  final  reorganization.  They 
arise,  take  possession  for  awhile  of  even  healthy  and  well-trained 
intellects,  and  then  give  place  to  others  that  have  their  day,  and  in 
their  turn  are  superseded.  In  our  time,  we  hear  of  proposals,  enter 
tained  here  and  there  even  by  men  who  know  what  positive  science 
is  in  some  one  department  of  study,  which  it  is  a  shock  to  one's 
hopes  to  see  so  advocated  ;  proposals,  for  instance,  to  abolish  money 


i22  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

and  recur  to  a  state  of  barter ;  to  destroy  the  great  capitals  in 
order  to  restore  rural  innocence ;  to  have  a  fixed  rate  of  wages, 
and  the  same  rate  for  every  kind  of  labor,  and  so  forth.  Such 
opinions  are  daily  given  out,  side  by  side  with  those  which  are  the 
most  philosophical  and  the  most  carefully  elaborated ;  and  none 
have  any  chance  of  being  established  under  the  rule  of  any  intel 
lectual  discipline  whatever,  though  the  wise  are  compromised  with 
the  foolish  in  the  eyes  of  public  reason.  The  inevitable  result  of 
D  --truction  of  such  a  chronic  epidemic  is  the  gradual  destruction  of 
public  mc.-raiity.  the  public  morale,  which  is  not  sustained,  among  the 
generality  of  men,  so  much  by  the  direct  sentiment  as  by  habit, 
guided  by  the  uniform  assent  of  individual  wills  to  invariable  and 
general  rules,  adapted  to  fix,  on  every  serious  occasion,  the  true 
idea  of  the  public  good.  So  complex  is  the  nature  of  social  ques 
tions  that  there  is  much  that  is  to  be  said  on  all  sides  ;  and  there 
is  no  institution,  however  indispensable,  which  does  not  involve 
serious  and  numerous  inconveniences,  more  or  less  partial  and  tran 
sient  ;  and,  on  the  other  hand,  there  is  no  Utopia  so  wild  as  not  to 
offer  some  incontestable  advantages  ;  and  few  are  the  minds  which 
are  not  so  preoccupied  by  ideas,  or  stimulated  by  passion,  as  to  be 
able  to  contemplate  at  once  all  the  aspects  of  any  social  subject. 
Thts  it  is  that  almost  all  the  great  maxims  of  public  morality  are 
condemned  on  account  of  their  salient  faults,  while  their  deter 
mining  grounds  are  hidden  till  exhibited  by  an  exact  analysis, 
which  must  in  many  cases  be  extremely  delicate.  Thus  again,  it  is 
that  all  true  moral  order  is  incompatible  with  the  existing  vagabond 
liberty  of  individual  minds,  if  such  license  were  to  last ;  for  the 
great  social  rules  which  should  become  customary  can  not  be  aban 
doned  to  the  blind  and  arbitrary  decision  of  an  incompetent  public 
without  losing  all  their  efficacy.  The  requisite  convergence  of  the 
best  minds  can  not  be  obtained  without  the  voluntary  renunciation, 
on  the  part  of  most  of  them,  of  their  sovereign  right  of  free  inquiry, 
which  they  will  doubtless  be  willing  to  abdicate,  as  soon  as  they 
have  found  organs  worthy  to  exercise  appropriately  their  vain  pro 
visional  supremacy.  If  it  is  so  in  problems  of  science,  there  is 
every  reason  to  expect  it  in  the  more  difficult  questions  of  social 
principle.  Meanwhile,  all  vague  notions  of  public  good,  degen 
erating  into  an  indistinct  philanthropy,  must  succumb  to  the  ener 
getic  forces  of  a  highly-stimulated  selfishness.  In  the  daily  course 
of  our  political  conflicts  we  see  accordingly  the  most  conscientious 
men  taxing  each  other  with  wickedness  and  folly ;  and,  on  every 
serious  occasion,  the  most  opposite  doctrines  maintained  by  persons 
equally  worthy  of  confidence  :  and,  while  all  deep  and  steady  con 
viction  is  thus  rendered  impossible,  no  true  political  morality  can 
he  hoped  for  by  those  who  desire  it  most. 

This  public  demoralization  has,  it  must  be  admitted,  been  sensi 
uly  retarded,  in  our  time,  by  the  preponderance  of  that  revolution 
ary  doctrine  which  has  borne  the  imputation  of  causing  it ;  for  the 
revolutionary  party,  progressive  in  character,  could  not  but  be 


PRIVATE   MORALITY.  423 

animated,  more  than  the  others,  by  sincere  convictions,  which,  in 
their  depth  and  activity,  must  tend  to  restrain,  and  even  annihilate, 
individual  selfishness.  This  was  especially  remarkable  during  the 
season  when  the  revolutionary  doctrine  was,  by  a  general  illusion, 
supposed  to  be  destined  to  reorganize  society.  Under  the  impulse 
of  this  persuasion,  the  strongest  social  devotedness  that  can  shed 
honor  upon  contemporary  history  was  manifested.  But  this  could 
be  only  for  a  time.  As  the  illusion  disappeared,  the  convictions 
which  arose  from  it  became  first  weakened,  and  then  mingled  with 
the  influences  of  the  stationary,  and  even  the  retrograde  polity : 
and  though  they  are  still  of  a  higher  order  than  those  which  are 
inspired  by  the  other  doctrines,  and  especially  among  the  young, 
they  have  not  energy  to  resist  the  dissolving  action  of  the  revolu 
tionary  philosophy,  even  among  its  own  advocates ;  so  that  this 
philosophy  now  contributes,  almost  as  much  as  its  two  antagonists, 
to  the  spread  of  political  demoralization. 

Private  morality  is,  happily,  much  less  dependent  on 
established  opinions.  Other  conditions  enter  into  this  Private 
case;  and  in  the  commonest  questions,  natural  sentiment  is  far 
more  operative  than  in  public  relations.  Disorganizing  influences 
are  strongly  counteracted  by  the  continuous  amelioration  of  our 
manners,  through  a  more  equitable  intellectual  development,  by  a 
juster  sense  and  more  familiar  taste  for  the  various  fine  arts,  aad 
by  the  gradual  improvement  of  social  condition  in  consequence  of 
steady  industrial  progress.  The  common  rules  of  domestic  and 
personal  morality  have  guarded  private  life  longer  than  political 
from  the  invasion  of  disorganizing  influences,  and  the  intrusion  of 
individual  analysis.  But  the  time  has  arrived  for  these  inevitable 
disturbances,  long  concealed,  to  manifest  their  dangerous  activity. 
So  long  ago  as  the  first  rise  of  the  revolutionary  state,  this  delete 
rious  influence  on  morality,  properly  so  called,  began  with  a  serious 
innovation  on  the  institution  of  Marriage,  which  would  have  been 
radically  changed,  by  the  permission  of  divorce  in  Protestant  coun 
tries,  if  public  decency  and  private  good  sense  had  not,  up  to  this 
time,  weakened  the  pernicious  effects  of  theologico-meta physical 
extravagances.  Still,  private  morality  could  be  reached  only 
through  the  destruction  of  political  morals ;  and  now,  that  barrier 
being  broken  through,  the  dissolving  action  threatens  domestic,  and 
even  personal  morality,  which  is  the  necessary  foundation  of  every 
other.  Whichever  way  we  look  at  it,  whether  as  to  the  relations 
of  the  sexes,  to  those  of  ages,  or  of  conditions,' it  is  clear  that  the 
elements  of  all  social  life  are  directly  compromised  by  a  corrosive 
discussion  which  is  not  directed  by  true  principles,  and  which 
brings  into  question,  without  the  possibility  of  solution,  even  the 
least  important  ideas  of  duty.  Even  the  Family,  which,  amidst  the 
fiercest  revolutionary  tumults,  had  been  on  the  whole  respected,  has 
been  assailed  in  our  day  in  its  very  foundations,  by  attacks  on  the 
hereditary  principle  and  on  marriage.  We  have  even  seen  the 
commonest-  principle  of  personal  morality,  the  subjection  of  the 


i24  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

passions  to  reason,  denied  by  pretended  reformers  who,  in  defiance 
of  all  experience  and  such  positive  science  as  we  have,  have  pro 
posed  as  a  fundamental  dogma  of  their  regenerated  morality,  the 
systematic  dominion  of  the  passions,  which  they  have  striven,  not 
to  restrain,  but  to  excite  by  the  strongest  stimulants.  These  spec 
ulations  have  so  far  penetrated  social  life,  that  any  one  is  now  at 
liberty  to  make  an  easy  merit  of  the  most  turbulent  passions ;  so 
that,  if  such  license  could  last,  insatiable  stomachs  might  at  length 
get  to  pride  themselves  on  their  own  voracity.  It  is  in  vain  for  the 
retrograde  school  to  throw  the  blame  of  all  this  on  the  revolution 
ary  school.  The  censure  rests  upon  themselves,  inasmuch  as  they 
have  persisted  in  extolling,  as  the  only  intellectual  bases  of  social 
duty,  principles  which  have  betrayed  their  impotence  in  this  very 
case ;  for,  if  theological  conceptions  are,  in  truth,  the  immutable 
bases  of  future  as  well  as  past  morality,  how  is  it  that  they  now  fail 
to  obviate  such  license  ?  What  are  we  to  think  of  the  attempt  to 
shore  up  by  laborious  artifices,  the  religious  principles  which  are 
proposed,  after  they  have  lost  their  strength,  as  the  only  supports 
of  moral  order  ?  No  supreme  function  can  be  assigned  to  convic 
tions  that  have  themselves  given  way  before  the  development  of 
human  reason,  which  is  not  likely  to  use  its  mature  power  to  recon 
struct  the  bonds  which  it  broke  through  in  the  efforts  of  its  youth. 
It  is  remarkable  that  the  license  I  have  spoken  of  has  been  proposed 
by  the  ardent  restorers  of  religious  theories,  in  their  exasperation 
against  all  positive  philosophy ;  and  this  has,  for  some  time  past, 
been  the  case  with  Protestant,  no  less  than  Catholic  advocates. 
So  far  from  furnishing  bases  for  morality,  domestic  or  personal, 
religious  convictions  have  long  tended  to  its  injury,  both  by  hinder 
ing  its  erection  on  more  solid  foundations  among  those  who  are  free 
from  their  control,  and  by  being  insufficient  for  their  own  subjects, 
without  the  active  intervention  of  a  sacerdotal  authority ;  that 
authority  meanwhile  perpetually  losing  its  hold  over  the  more 
advanced  populations,  and  being  more  and  more  absorbed  by  the 
care  of  its  own  preservation,  instead  of  venturing  upon  any  unpop 
ular  scheme  of  discipline.  Daily  experience  shows  that  the  ordi 
nary  morality  of  religious  men  is  not,  at  present,  in  spite  of  our 
intellectual  anarchy,  superior  to  that  of  the  average  of  those  who 
have  quitted  the  churches.  The  chief  practical  tendency  of  reli 
gious  conviction  is,  in  our  present  social  life,  to  inspire  an  instinctive 
and  insurmountable  hatred  against  all  who  have  emancipated  them 
selves,  without  any  useful  emulation  having  arisen  from  the  conflict. 
Thus  the  chief  assaults,  direct  and  indirect,  on  private  as  well  as 
public  morality,  are  as  strictly  imputable  to  the  stationary,  and  yet 
more  to  the  retrograde,  than  to  the  revolutionary  philosophy,  which 
is  commonly  made  to  bear  all  the  blame.  It  is,  indeed,  but  too 
evident  that  the  three  doctrines  are  almost  equally  powerless  to 
restrain  the  development  of  individual  selfishness,  which  grows 
bolder,  from  day  to  day,  in  clamoring  for  the  license  of  the  least 
social  passions,  in  the  name  of  universal  intellectual  anarchy. 


TO   PUBLIC   MORALITY.  425 

The  second  characteristic  of  our  condition  follows  Po]itica]  corro 
from  the  first.     It  is  the  systematic  corruption  which  tionM 
is  set  up  as  an  indispensable  instrument  of  government.     The  three 
doctrines  bear  their  share,  though  it  may  be  an  unequal  one,  in 
this  disgraceful  result,  because  all  exclude,  as  we  have  seen,  true 
political  convictions.     Amidst  the  absence,  or  the  discredit,  of  gen- 
sral  ideas,  which  have  now  no  power  to  command  genuine  acts, 
there  is  no  other  daily  resource  for  the  maintenance  of  even  a 
rough  and  precarious  order  than  an  appeal,  more  or  less  immediate, 
to  personal  interests.     Such  an  influence  is  scarcely  ever  needed 
with  men  of  deep  convictions.     Even  in  the  lower  order  of  charac 
ters,  human  nature  is  rarely  so  debased  as  to  allow  a  course  of 
political  conduct  in  opposition  to  any  strong  convictions ;  and  such 
contrariety,  if  persevered  in,  Avould  soon  paralyze  the  faculties.     In 
the  scientific  class,  in  which  philosophical  convictions  are  at  present 
most  common  and  best  marked,  active  corruption  is  scarcely  prac 
ticable,  though  minds  are  there  much  of  the  same  quality  as  they 
are  elsewhere.     Thus,  exceptional  cases  apart,  the  rapid  spread  of- 
a  corruption  which  avails  itself  of  the  half-convictions  that  are  prev 
alent  in  the  political  world  must  be  attributed  mainly  to  the  unde 
cided  and  fluctuating  state  in  which  social  ideas  are  kept  by  the 
intellectual  anarchy  of  our  time.     Not  only  does  this  disorder  of 
minds  permit  the  political  corruption :  it  even  requires  it,  as  the 
only  means  of  obtaining  any  sort  of  practical  convergence,  such  as 
is  necessary  for  the  mere  preservation  of  the  social  state  in  its 
grossest  interests  :  and  we  must  prepare  ourselves  for  the  continu 
ous  extension  of  the  evil,  as  long  as  intellectual  anarchy  goes  on 
destroying  all  strong  political  conviction.     Rulers  and  the  ruled 
are  alike  guilty  in  regard  to  this  vice  :  the  rulers  by  their  disdain 
of  all  social  theory  ;  by  their  repression  of  mind,  and  by  their  appli 
cation  of  the  instrument  which  they  can  not  dispense  with  to  their 
own,  instead  of  the  general  interest ;  and  the  ruled  by  their  accept 
ance  of  the  proffered  corruption,  and  by  their  intellectual  condition 
rendering  the  use  of  it  inevitable v    If  individuals  can  not  co-ope 
rate  on  any  other  ground  than  that  of  private  interest,  they  have 
no  right  to  complain  that  governments  take  the  same  ground  to 
procure  the  assistance  that  they  can  not  dispense  with,  during  a 
period  in  which  it  is  scarcely  possible  1o  see  clearly  what  the  public 
good  really  consists  in.     All  that  can  be  said  for  such  a  state  of 
things  is  that  matters  would  be  worse  if  individual  eccentricities 
were  not  somewhat  restrained  by  personal  interest,  in  the  absence 
of  better  influences  ;  and  that  it  is  the  natural  result  of  the  situation 
to  which  it  applies,  and  therefore  certainly  destined  to  disappear 
whenever  society  shall  begin  to  admit  of  a  better  discipline.     Till 
then  we  must  expect  to  see  this  miserable  expedient  more  and  more 
resorted  to ;  as  is  proved  by  the  constant  experience  of  all  peoples 
living  under  a  prolonged  constitutional  or  representative  regime, 
as  we  now  call  it,  always  compelled  to  organize  in  this  manner  a 
certain  material  discipline  in  the  midst  of  a  complete  intellectual, 


426  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

and  therefore  moral  anarchy.  All  that  we  have  a  right  to  require 
is  that  governments,  instead  of  welcoming  this  disastrous  necessity, 
and  making  an  eager  use  of  the  facilities  it  offers,  should  set  them 
selves  to  favor,  systematically,  by  all  the  means  at  their  command, 
the  great  philosophical  elaboration  through  which  modern  society 
may  enter  upon  a  better  course. 

By  corruption,  I  do  not  mean  only  direct  venality,  nor  yet  the 
holding  of  honorary  distinctions  which  are  merely  flattering  to  the 
vanity.  The  scope  offered  to  various  kinds  of  ambition  is  a  more 
corrupting  influence.  In  some  countries  this  had  been  carried  so 
far,  in  the  form  of  creation  of  offices,  that  nations  are  farmed  by 
the  functionaries  of  their  governments.  The  danger  of  such  a 
course  is  obvious  enough  ;  for  the  number  of  aspirants,  where  offices 
are  very  numerous,  must  always  largely  exceed  that  of  the  chosen ; 
and  their  disappointment  must  awaken  passions  anything  but  favor 
able  to  the  established  regime.  Moreover,  the  practice  must  spread 
the  more  it  is  resorted  to ;  and  it  will  go  on  extending  till  the  time 
for  social  reorganization  has  arrived.  Here,  again,  all  the  three 
schools  must  share  the  blame.  The  Revolutionary  school  supplied, 
as  we  have  seen,  the  dissolving  influence  which  rendered  the  system 
of  corruption  necessary.  The  Stationary  school  even  sets  it  up  as 
a  type,  declaring  the  equal  admission  of  all  the  public  functions  to 
be  the  final  destination  of  the  general  social  movement ;  and  ag 
gravating  the  case  by  connecting  the  conditions  of  order  with  the 
mere  possession  of  fortune,  however  obtained.  As  for  the  Retrograde 
school,  with  all  its  pretensions  to  moral  purity,  it  employs  corrup 
tion  as  fatally  as  the  other  two,  under  the  special  form  which  it 
appropriates, — that  of  systematic  hypocrisy.  From  the  opening 
of  the  revolutionary  period,  in  the  sixteenth  century,  this  system 
of  hypocrisy  has  been  more  and  more  elaborated  in  practice,  per 
mitting  the  emancipation  of  all  minds  of  a  certain  bearing,  on  the 
tacit  condition  that  they  should  aid  in  protracting  the  submission 
of  the  masses.  This  was,  eminently,  the  policy  of  the  Jesuits. 
Thus  has  the  retrograde  school  suffered  under  this  vice  as  early  as 
the  others ;  and  it  can  not  but  resort  to  corruption  more  and  more, 
in  proportion  to  its  own  opposition  to  the  general  movement  of  the 
society  which  it  pretends  to  rule. 

This,  then,  is  our  state.  For  want  of  a  moral  authority,  material 
order  requires  the  use  of  either  terror  or  corruption  ;  and  the  latter 
is  both  more  durable,  less  inconvenient,  and  more  accordant  with 
the  nature  of  modern  society  than  the  former.  But,  while  admit 
ting  the  inevitable  character  of  the  evil,  it  is  impossible  not  to 
lament,  bitterly  and  mournfully,  the  blindness  which  prevents  the 
social  powers  of  our  time  from  facilitating  to  the  utmost  the 
philosophical  evolution  by  which  alone  we  can  issue  into  a  better 
state.  It  seems  as  if  statesmen  of  all  parties  were  agreed  to  close 
this  sole  avenue  of  safety  by  visiting  with  stupid  reprobation  all 
elaboration  of  social  theories.  This  again,  however,  is  only  another 
consequence  of  the  present  state  of  the  most  civilized  nations ;  and, 


UNWORTHINESS   OF   POLITICAL   QUESTIONS.  427 

as  a  consequence,  not  less  necessary  or  characteristic  than  those 
that  have  gone  before. 

The  third  symptom  of  our  social  situation  is  the 
growing  preponderance  of  material  and  immediate  con-  $!Sajfa*v£. 
siderations  in  regard  to  political  questions.  There  is  tions- 
something  more  concerned  here  than  the  ordinary  antagonism  be 
tween  theory  and  practice,  aggravated  by  the  weakness  of  attempts 
at  theory  in  an  infantile  period  of  social  science.  The  repugnance 
to  theory  is  further  attributable  to  the  historical  circumstances  that 
when,  three  centuries  ago,  the  spiritual  power  was  finally  annulled 
or  absorbed  by  the  temporal,  all  lofty  social  speculations  were  more 
and  more  devolved  upon  minds  which  were  always  pre-occupied  by 
practical  affairs.  Thus  kings  and  their  peoples  concurred  in 
exalting  the  lower  order  of  considerations;  and  the  tendency 
belonged  to  all  the  three  schools  of  polity.  If  the  crowning  evil 
of  our  time  be  its  intellectual  anarchy,  it  is  clear  that  we  can  not 
too  strongly  lament  this  irrational  unanimity  of  the  political  world 
in  closing  the  path  of  progress  by  proscribing  speculative  researches. 
We  see  the  consequences  in  our  experience  of  the  past  Fntnl  to  Prog. 
century.  In  seeking  social  reorgonization,  men  have  ress- 
not  first  looked  to  the  doctrines  of  a  new  social  order,  and  then  to 
the  corresponding  manners ;  but  have  gone  straight  to  the  con 
struction  of  institutions,  at  a  time  when  we  .have  all  possible 
evidence  that  institutions  can  be  nothing  more  than  provisional, 
restricted  to  the  most  indispensable  objects,  and  having  no  other 
relation  to  the  future  than  such  facility  as  they  may  afford  to  the 
process  of  political  regeneration.  The  making  of  institutions  in 
our  day  consists  in  parcelling  out  the  old  political  powers,  minutely 
organizing  factitious  and  complex  antagonisms  among  them,  render 
ing  them  more  and  more  precarious  by  submitting  them  to  election 
for  terms ;  but  in  no  way  changing  either  the  general  nature  of  the 
ancient  regime  or  the  spirit  which  worked  it.  For  want  of  all 
social  doctrine,  nothing  more  has  been  attempted  than  restraining 
the  powers  thus  preserved,  till  there  is  every  danger  of  their  being 
altogether  annulled,  while  the  principles  which  were  to  direct  their 
application  were  left  doubtful  and  obscure.  The  pompous  name  of 
a  Constitution  is  then  given  to  this  piece  of  work,  and  it  is  con 
secrated  to  the  eternal  admiration  of  posterity.  Though  the  aver 
age  duration  of  these  constitutions  has  been  at  most  ten  years,  each 
new  system,  set  up  on  the  very  ground  of  the  failure  of  the  last, 
has  claimed,  under  pains  and  penalties,  a  general  faith  in  its  abso 
lute  and  indefinite  triumph.  The  only  action  of  such  institutions 
is  in  preventing  all  social  reorganization  by  fixing  minds  on  puerile 
questions  of  political  forms,  and  by  interdicting  speculations  and 
philosophical  discussion  which  would  disclose  the  principles  of  re 
organization.  By  this  action,  the  character  of  the  disease  has 
been  concealed  as  much  as  possible,  and  any  gradual  and  specific 
cure  has  been  almost  impracticable.  It  is  strange  that  minds  should 
:>e  so  self-deceived  as  to  disclaim  all  speculative  prejudices  while 


428  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

they  propose  the  most  absurd  of  all  political  Utopias, — the  con 
struction  of  a  system  of  government  which  rests  upon  no  true  social 
doctrine.  Such  an  absurdity  is  referrible  to  the  cloudy  prevalence 
of  the  metaphysical  philosophy,  which  perverts  and  confuses  men's 
notions  in  politics,  as  it  did  formerly,  during  its  short  triumph,  in 
all  other  orders  of  human  conceptions. 

F  tni  to  orier  ^  *s  not  on^  as  an  impediment  to  progress  that  the 
preponderance  of  material  conceptions  is  to  be  deplor 
ed.  It  is  dangerous  to  order.  When  all  political  evils  are  imputed 
to  institutions  instead  of  to  ideas  and  social  manners,  which  are 
now  the  real  seat  of  the  mischief,  the  remedy  is  vainly  sought  in 
changes,  each  more  serious  then  the  last,  in  institutions  and  existing 
powers.  The  failure  of  the  last  change  is  forgotten ;  and  hopes 
are  concentrated  on  the  next,  showing  how  ineffectual  are  the 
lessons  of  experience  when  the  results  are  not  elucidated  by  a 
rational  analysis.  Such  changes  must  occur,  in  our  progress  to  a 
better  state.  What  it  is  fair  to  require  in  regard  to  them  is  that 
they  should  be  recognised  as  provisional,  and  be  guided  by  some 
philosophical  consideration  of  the  social  question  at  large.  Another 
consequence  of  the  prevalent  preference  of  institutions  to  doctrines 
is,  besides  its  prematurity,  its  engendering  errors  of  the  most 
serious  kind,  and  of  a  permanent  character,  by  including  in  the 
domain  of  temporal  government  what  belongs  to  the  spiritual.  For 
their  neglect  of  this  grand  distinction,  the  various  governments  of 
Europe  have  been  punished  by  becoming  responsible  for  all  the 
evils  of  society,  whencesoever  they  might  have  arisen.  The  illusion 
is  yet  more  injurious  to  society  itself  through  the  disturbances  asd 
mortifications  which  it  induces.  An  illustration  of  the  case  is 
presented  by  the  discussions  and  attacks  which  have  so  often 
menaced  the  institution  of  Property.  It  is  impossible  to  deny  that, 
when  all  exaggerations  are  stripped  away,  an  unquestionable  amount 
of  evil  remains  in  connection  with  property,  which  ought  to  be 
taken  in  hand,  and  remedied,  as  far  as  our  modern  social  state 
permits.  But  it  is  equally  evident  that  the  remedy  must  arise  from 
opinions,  customs,  and  manners,  and  that  political  regulations  can 
have  no  radical  efficacy  ;  for  the  question  refers  us  to  public  prepos 
sessions  and  usages  which  must  habitually  direct,  for  the  interest 
of  society,  the  exercise  of  property,  in  whose  hands  soever  it  may 
DC  lodged.  We  may  see  here  how  futile  and  how  blind,  and  also 
how  disturbing,  is  this  tendency  to  refer  everything  to  political  insti 
tutions,  instead  of  fixing  expectation  on  an  intellectual  and  moral 
reorganization. 

Thus  we  proceed,  securing  neither  order  nor  progress,  while  we 
consider  our  sufferings  to  be  of  a  physical,  whereas  they  are  really 
of  a  moral  nature.  Modifications  of  ancient  systems  have  been 
tried,  and  have  given  no  relief;  and  our  ideas  of  political  progress 
are  narrowing  down  to  that  of  a  substitution  of  persons, — the  most 
disgraceful  political  degradation  of  all,  because,  directed  by  no 
plan,  it  tends  to  subject  society  to  an  interminable  series  of  catas- 


INCOMPETENCE   OP   POLITICAL   LEADERS.  429 

troplies.  The  material  order,  which  is  all  that  is  contemplated,  is 
confided  to  a  power  which  is  regarded  as  hostile,  and  perpetually 
enfeebled  by  a  systematic  antagonism.  The  restricted  view  of  each 
of  the  agents  of  such  a  mechanism  prevents  their  co-operation, 
except  under  the  immediate  alarm  of  material  anarchy,  when  they 
suspend  their  useless  controversies  till  the  storm  has  blown  over, 
when  they  go  on  as  before,  till  some  catastrophe  ensues,  taking 
everybody  by  surprise,  though  any  one  might  have  foreseen  it.  In 
this  discarding  of  social  speculation  for  the  sake  of  material  and 
immediate  considerations,  we  see  a  fresh  indication  that  intellectual 
anarchy  is  the  main  cause  of  our  social  maladies. 

A  fourth  characteristic  of  our  social  condition  is  a  In(.ompetenc,,  of 
natural  consequence  and  complement  of  the  preceding ;  political  leader*. 
the  incompetence  of  the  minds  which  occupy  the  chief  political  sta 
tions,  during  such  a  condition  of  affairs,  and  even  their  antipathy  to 
a  true  reorganization :  so  that  a  final,  and  not  less  disastrous  illu 
sion  of  modern  society  is  that  the  solution  of  the  problem  may  be 
looked  for  from  those  who  can  do  nothing  but  hinder  it.  From 
what  we  have  already  seen,  we  must  be  aware  that  the  gradual 
demolition  of  all  social  maxims,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the  attenu 
ation  of  political  action,  must  tend  to  remove  elevated  minds  and 
superior  understandings  from  such  a  career,  and  to  deliver  over 
the  political  world  to  the  rule  of  charlatanism  and  mediocrity. 
The  absence  of  any  distinct  and  large  conception  of  a  social  future 'is 
favorable  to  the  more  vulgar  forms  of  ambition  ;  and  presumptuous 
and  enterprising  mediocrity  has  never  before  had  so  fortunate  a 
chance.  While  social  principles  are  not  even  sought,  charlatanism 
will  always  attract  by  the  magnificence  of  its  promises  ;  and  its  tran 
sient  successes  will  dazzle  society,  while  in  a  suffering  condition,  and 
deprived  of  all  rational  hope.  Every  impulse  of  noble  ambition 
must  turn  the  best  men  away  from  a  field  of  action  where  there  is 
no  chance  of  scope  and  permanence,  such  as  are  requisite  to  the 
carrying  out  of  generous  schemes.  It  is,  as  M.  Guizot  has  well 
said,  a  social  period  when  men  ivill  feebly,  but  desire  immensely. 
It  is  a  state  of  half-conviction  and  half-will,  resulting  from  intellec 
tual  and  moral  anarchy,  offering  many  obstacles  to  the  solution  of 
our  difficulties.  It  is  important,  however,  not  to  exaggerate  those 
obstacles.  This  very  state  of  half-conviction  and  half-will  tends 
to  facilitate  by  anticipation  the  prevalence  of  a  true  conception  of 
society  which,  once  produced,  wrill  have  no  active  resistance  to 
withstand,  because  it  will  repose  on  serious  convictions :  and  at 
present,  the  dispersion  of  social  interests  tends  to  preserve  the 
material  order  which  is  an  indispensable  condition  of  philosophical 
growth.  It  would  be  a  mere  satirical  exaggeration  to  describe 
existing  society  as  preferring  political  quackery  and  illusion  to  that 
wise  settlement  which  it  has  not  had  opportunity  to  obtain.  When 
the  choice  is  offered,  it  wrill  be  seen  whether  the  attraction  of  decep 
tive  promises,  and  the  power  of  former  habit,  will  prevent  our  ago 
from  entering,  with  ardor  and  steadiness,  upon  a  better  course. 


430  POSITIVE  PHILOSOPHY. 

There  are  evident  symptoms  that  the  choice  will  be  a  wise  one, 
though  the  circumstances  of  the  time  operate  to  place  the  direction 
of  the  movement  in  hands  which  are  anything  but  fittest  for  the 
purpose.  This  inconvenience  dates  from  the  beginning  of  the  rev 
olutionary  period,  and  is  not  a  new,  but  an  aggravated  evil.  For 
three  centuries  past,  the  most  eminent  minds  have  been  chiefly 
engaged  with  science,  and  have  neglected  politics ;  thus  differing 
widely  from  the  wisest  men  in  ancient  times,  and  even  in  the  Mid 
dle  Ages.  The  consequence  of  this  is  that  the  most  difficult  and 
urgent  questions  have  been  committed  to  the  class  which  is  essen 
tially  one  under  two  names, — the  civilians  and  the  metaphysicians,  | 
or,  under  their  common  title,  the  lawyers  and  men  of  letters,  whose  •» 
position  in  regard  to  statesmanship  is  naturally  a  subordinate  one. 
We  shall  see  hereafter  that,  from  its  origin  to  the  time  of  the  first 
French  Revolution,  the  system  of  metaphysical  polity  was  expressed  ^ 
and  directed  by  the  universities  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  great/ 
judiciary  corporations  on  the  other :  the  fii'st  constituting  a  sori 
of  spiritual,  and  the  other  the  temporal  power.  This  state  of 
things  is  still  traceable  in  most  countries  of  the  continent ;  while 
in  France,  for  above  half  a  century,  the  arrangement  has  degen 
erated  into  such  an  abuse  that  the  judges  are  .superseded  by  the 
bar,  and  the  doctors  (as  they  used  to  be  called)  by  mere  men  of 
letters ;  so  that  now,  any  man  who  can  hold  a  pen  may  aspire  to 
the  spiritual  regulation  of  society,  through  the  press  or  from  the 
professional  chair,  unconditionally,  and  whatever  may  be  his  quali 
fications.  When  the  time  comes  for  the  constitution  of  an  organic 
condition,  the  reign  of  sophists  and  declaimers  will  have  come  to  an 
end :  but  there  will  be  the  impediment  to  surmount  of  their  having 
been  provisionally  in  possession  of  public  confidence. 

The  survey  that  we  have  made  must  convince  us  only  too  well 
of  the  anarchical  state  of  existing  society,  under  its  destitution  of 
guiding  and  governing  ideas,  and  amid  its  conflict  of  opinions  and 
passions,  which  there  is  no  power  in  any  of  the  three  schools  to 
cure  or  moderate.  As  preliminary  considerations,  these  facts  are 
deeply  disheartening ;  and  we  can  not  wonder  that  some  generous 
and  able  but  ill-prepared  minds  should  have  sunk  into  a  kind  of 
philosophical  despair  about  the  future  of  society,  which  appears 
to  them  doomed  to  fall  under  a  gloomy  despotism  or  into  mere  anar 
chy,  or  to  oscillate  between  the  two.  I  trust  that  the  study  we  are 
about  to  enter  upon  will  give  rise  to  a  consoling  conviction  that  the 
movement  of  regeneration  is  going  on,  though  quietly  in  comparison 
with  the  apparent  decomposition,  and  that  the  most  advanced  of 
the  human  race  are  at  the  threshold  of  a  social  order  worthy  of 
their  nature  and  their  needs.  I  shall  conclude  this  introduction  by 
showing  what  must  necessarily  be  the  intellectual  character  of  the 
salutary  philosophy  which  is  to  lead  us  into  this  better  future  :  and 
its  dogmatic  exposition  will  follow  in  the  next  chapters. 
Advent  of  tho  The  preliminary  survey  which  I  have  just  concluded 
posmve  Phiios-  led  ug  necessarilj  into  tlie  domain  of  politics.  We 


ADVENT   OP  THE   POSITIVE  PHILOSOPHY.  431 

must  now  return  from  this  excursion,  and  take  our  stand  again 
at  the  point  of  view  of  this  whole  Work,  and  contemplate  the 
condition  and  prospects  of  society  from  the  ground  of  positive 
philosophy.  Every  other  ground  has  been  found  untenable.  The 
theological  and  metaphysical  philosophies  have  failed  to  secure 
permanent  social  welfare,  while  the  positive  philosophy  tes  uni 
formly  succeeded,  and  conspicuously  for  three  centuries  past,  in 
reorganizing,  to  the  unanimous  satisfaction  of  the  intellectual  world, 
all  the  anterior  orders  of  human  conceptions,  which  had  been  till  then 
in  the  same  chaotic  state  that  we  now  deplore,  in  regard  to  social 
science.  Contemporary  opinion  regarded  the  state  of  each  of  those 
sciences  as  hopeless  till  the  positive  philosophy  brought  them  out 
of  it.  There  is  no  reason  why  it  should  fail  in  the  latest  applica 
tion,  after  having  succeeded  in  all  the  earlier.  Advancing  from  the 
less  complex  categories  of  ideas  to  the  more  complex  and  final  one, 
and  comparing  with  this  experience  the  picture  just  given  of  our 
present  social  condition,  we  can  not  but  see  that  the  political 
analysis  and  the  scientific  concur  in  demonstrating  that  the  posi 
tive  philosophy,  carried  on  to  its  completion,  is  the  only  possible 
agent  in  the  reorganization  of  modern  society.  I  wish  to  establish 
this  principle  first,  and  in  this  place,  apart  from  all  considerations 
about  my  way  of  proving  my  point ;  so  that,  if  my  attempt  should 
be  hereafter  condemned,  no  unfavorable  inference  may  be  drawn  in 
regard  to  a  method  which  alone  can  save  society,  and  that  public 
reason  should  have  nothing  to  do  but  to  require  from  happier  suc 
cessors  more  effectual  endeavors  in  the  same  direction.  In  all 
cases,  and  especially  in  this,  the  method  is  of  even  more  importance 
than  the  doctrine :  and  it  is  for  this  reason  that  I  think  it  right, 
before  closing  my  long  introduction,  to  otfer,  in  a  brief  form,  some 
last  prefatory  considerations. 

This  is  not  the  place  in  which  to  enter  upon  any  comparison 
between  the  positive  political  philosophy  and  the  other  social  theo 
ries  which  have  been  tried ;  but,  while  still  deferring  the  scientific 
appreciation  of  the  positive  method,  and  before  quitting  the  politi 
cal  ground  on  which  I  have,  for  the  occasion,  taken  my  stand,  I 
must  point  out  in  a  direct  and  general  way,  the  relation  of  the 
positive  philosophy  to  the  two  great  necessities  of  our  age. 

The   ascendency   of    a  positive   social    doctrine   is  L()ffical  cohe^ 
secured  by  its  perfect  logical  coherence  in  its  entire  renece  of  the 
application — a  characteristic  property  which  enables  us 
at  once  to  connect  the  political  with  the  scientific  point  of  view. 
The  positive  polity  will  embrace  at  once  all  the  essential  aspects 
of  the  present  state  of  civilization,  and  will  dissolve  the  deplorable 
opposition  that  now  exists  between  the  two  orders  of  social  needs, 
the  common  satisfaction  of  which  will  henceforth  depend  on  the 
same  principle.     It  will  impart  a  homogeneous  and  rational  char 
acter  to  the  desultory  politics  of  our  day,  and  it  will  by  the  bame 
act  connect  this  co-ordinated  present  with  the  whole  past,  so  as  to 
ostablish  a  general  harmony  in  the  entire  system  of  social  ideas,  by 


'132  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY, 

exhibiting  the  fundamental  uniformity  of  the  collective  life  of 
humanity ;  for  this  conception  can  not,  by  its  nature,  be  applied  to 
the  actual  social  state  till  it  has  undergone  the  test  of  explaining, 
from  the  same  point  of  view,  the  continuous  series  of  the  chief  for 
mer  transformations  of  society.  It  is  important  to  note  this  differ 
ence  between  the  positive  principle  and  that  of  the  two  other 
schools.  The  critical  school  treats  all  times  prior  to  the  revolu 
tionary  period  with  a  blind  reprobation.  The  retrograde  school 
equally  fails  in  uniting  the  present  with  the  past,  and  uniformly 
disparages  the  position  of  modern  society  during  the  last  three  cen 
turies.  It  is  the  exclusive  property  of  the  positive  principle  to 
recognise  the  fundamental  law  of  continuous  human  development, 
representing  the  existing  evolution  as  the  necessary  result  of  the 
1  gradual  series  of  former  transformations,  by  simply  extending  to 
social  phenomena  the  spirit  which  governs  the  treatment  of  all  other 
natural  phenomena.  This  coherence  and  homogeneousness  of  the 
positive  principle  is  further  shown  by  its  operation  in  not  only  com 
prehending  all  the  various  social  ideas  in  one  whole,  but  in  connect 
ing  the  system  with  the  whole  of  natural  philosophy,  and  consti 
tuting  thus  the  aggregate  of  human  knowledge  as  a  complete 
scientific  hierarchy.  We  shall  see  hereafter  how  this  is  accom 
plished,  and  I  mention  it  now  to  show  how  the  positive  philosophy, 
finding  thus  a  general  fulcrum  in  all  minds,  can  not  but  spread  to  a 
universal  extension.  In  the  present  chaotic  state  of  our  political 
ideas,  we  can  scarcely  imagine  what  must  be  the  irresistible  energy 
of  a  philosophical  movement,  in  which  the  entire  renovation  of 
social  science  will  be  directed  by  the  same  spirit  which  is  unani 
mously  recognised  as  effectual  in  all  other  departments  of  human 
knowledge.  Meantime,  it  finds  some  points  of  contact  in  the  most 
wilful  minds,  whence  it  may  proceed  to  work  a  regeneration  of 
views.  It  speaks  to  every  class  of  society,  and  to  every  political 
party,  the  language  best  adapted  to  produce  conviction,  while  main 
taining  the  invincible  originality  of  its  fundamental  character.  It 
alone,  embracing  in  its  survey  the  whole  of  the  social  question,  can 
render  exact  justice  to  the  conflicting  schools,  by  estimating  their 
past  and  present  services.  It  alone  can  exhibit  to  each  party  its 
highest  destination,  prescribing  order  in  the  name  of  progress,  and 
progress  in  the  name  of  order,  so  that  each,  instead  of  annulling, 
may  strengthen  the  other.  Bringing  no  stains  from  the  past,  this 
new  polity  is  subject  to  no  imputation  of  retrograde  tyranny,  or 
of  revolutionary  anarchy.  The  only  charge  that  can  be  brought 
against  it  is  that  of  novelty ;  and  the  answer  is  furnished  by  the 
evident  insufficiency  of  all  existing  theories,  and  by  the  fact  that 
for  two  centuries  past  its  success  has  been  uniform  and  complete, 
wherever  it  has  been  applied. 

its  eff-ct  on  Or-       As  to  its  operation  upon  Order,  it  is  plain  that  true 
ier.  '"  science  has  no  other  aim  than  the  establishment  of  in 

tellectual  order,  which  is   the   basis   of  every   other.     Disorder 
dreads  the  scientific  spirit  even  more  than  the  theological,  and,  in 


ITS   EFFECT   ON   ORDER.  433 

the  field  of  politics,  minds  which  rebelled  against  metaphysical 
hypotheses  and  theological  fictions  submit  without  difficulty  to  the 
discipline  of  the  positive  method.  We  even  see  that  while  the 
mind  of  our  day  is  accused  of  tending  toward  absolute  skepticism, 
it  eagerly  welcomes  the  least  appearance  of  positive  demonstration, 
however  premature  and  imperfect.  The  eagerness  would  be  full  as 
great  if  the  idea  were  once  formed  that  social  science  might  also 
be  conducted  by  the  positive  spirit.  The  conception  of  invariable 
natural  laws,  the  foundation  of  every  idea  of  order,  in  all  the  de 
partments,  would  have  the  same  philosophical  efficacy  here  as  else 
where,  as  soon  as  it  was  sufficiently  generalized  to  be  applied  to 
social  phenomena,  thenceforth  referred,  like  all  other  phenomena, 
to  such  laws.  It  is  only  by  the  positive  polity  that  the  revolution 
ary  spirit  can  be  restrained,  because  by  it  alone  can  the  influence 
of  the  critical  doctrine  be  justly  estimated  and  circumscribed.  No 
longer  roused  to  resistance,  as  by  the  retrograde  school,  and  see 
ing  its  work  done  better  than  by  itself,  it  will  merge  in  a  doctrine 
which  leaves  it  nothing  to  do  or  to  desire.  Under  the  rule  of  the 
positive  spirit,  again,  all  the  difficult  and  delicate  questions  which 
now  keep  up  a  perpetual  irritation  in  the  bosom  of  society,  and 
which  can  never  be  settled  while  mere  political  solutions  are  pro 
posed,  will  be  scientifically  estimated,  to  the  great  furtherance  of 
social  peace.  By  admitting  at  once  that  the  institutions  of  modern 
societies  must  necessarily  be  merely  provisional,  the  positive  spirit 
will  abate  unreasonable  expectations  from  them,  and  concentrate 
effort  upon  a  fundamental  renovation  of  social  ideas,  and  conse 
quently  of  public  morals.  Instead  of  indifference  being  caused  by 
this  carrying  forward  of  political  aims,  there  will  be  a  new  source 
of  interest  in  so  modifying  modern  institutions  as  to  make  them  con 
tributory  to  the  inevitable  intellectual  and  moral  evolution.  At  the 
same  time,  it  will  be  teaching  society  that,  in  the  present  state  of 
their  ideas,  no  political  change  can  be  of  supreme  importance,  while 
the  perturbation  attending  change  is  supremely  mischievous,  in  the 
way  both  of  immediate  hinderance  and  of  diverting  attention  from 
the  true  need  and  procedure.  And  again,  order  will  profit  by  the 
recognition  of  the  relative  spirit  of  the  positive  philosophy,  which 
discredits  the  absolute  spirit  of  the  theological  and  metaphysi 
cal  schools.  It  can  not  but  dissipate  the  illusion  by  which  those 
schools  are  for  ever  striving  to  set  up,  in  all  stages  of  civili 
zation,  their  respective  types  of  immutable  government ;  as  when . 
for  instance,  they  propose  to  civilize  Tahiti  by  a  wholesale  importa 
tion  of  Protestantism  and  a  Parliamentary  system.  Again,  the 
positive  spirit  tends  to  consolidate  order,  by  the  rational  devel 
opment  of  a  wise  resignation  to  incurable  political  evils.  Negative 
as  is  the  character  of  this  virtue,  it  affords  an  aid  under  the  pains 
of  the  human  lot  which  can  not  be  dispensed  with,  and  which  has 
no  place  under  the  metaphysical  polity,  which  regards  political  ac 
tion  as  indefinite.  Religious,  and  especially  Christian  resignation 
is,  in  plain  truth,  only  a  prudent  temporizing,  which  enjoins  the  en- 

28 


434  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

durance  of  present  suffering  in  view  of  an  ultimate  ineffable  felicity. 
A  true  resignation — that  is,  a  permanent  disposition  to  endure, 
steadily,  and  without  hope  of  compensation,  all  inevitable  evils,  can 
proceed  only  from  a  deep  sense  of  the  connection  of  all  kinds  of 
natural  phenomena  with  invariable  laws.     If  there  are  (as  I  doubt 
not  there  are)  political  evils  which,  like  some  personal  sufferings, 
can  not  be  remedied  by  science,  science  at  least  proves  to  ug  that 
they  are  incurable,  so  as  to  calm  our  restlessness  under  pain  by  the 
conviction  that  it  is  by  natural  laws  that  they  are  rendered  insur 
mountable.     Human  nature  suffers  in  its  relations  with  the  astro 
nomical  world,  and  the  physical,  chemical,  and  biological,  as  well 
as  the  political.     How  is  it  that  we  turbulently  resist  in  the  last 
case,  while,  in  the  others,  we  are  calm  and  resigned,  under  pain  as 
signal  and  as  repugnant  to  our  nature  ?     Surely  it  is  because  the 
positive  philosophy  has  as  yet  developed  our  sense  of  the  natural 
laws  only  in  regard  to  the  simpler  phenomena ;  and  when  the  same 
sense  shall  have  been  awakened  with  regard  to  the  more  complex 
phenomena  of  social  life,  it  will  fortify  us  with  a  similar  resigna 
tion,  general  or  special,  provisional  or  indefinite,  in  the  case  of 
political  suffering.     An  habitual  conviction  of  this  kind  can  not  but 
conduce  to  public  tranquillity,  by  obviating  vain  efforts  for  redress, 
while  it  equally  excludes  the  apathy  which  belongs  to  the  passive 
character  of  religious  resignation,  by  requiring  submission  to  noth 
ing  but  necessity,  and  encouraging  the  noblest  exercise  of  human 
activity,  wherever  the  analysis  of  the  occasion  opens  any  prospect 
whatever  of  genuine  remedy.     Finally,  the  positive  philosophy  be 
friends  public  order  by  bringing  back  men's  understandings  to  a 
normal  state  through  the  influence  of  its  method  alone,  before  it  has 
had  time  to  establish  any  social*theory.     It  dissipates  disorder  at 
once  by  imposing  a  series  of  indisputable  scientific  conditions  on 
the  study  of  political  questions.     By  including  social  science  in  the 
scientific  hierarchy,  the  positive  spirit  admits  to  success  in  this 
study  only  well-prepared  and  disciplined  minds,  so  trained  in  the 
preceding  departments  of  knowledge  as  to  be  fit  for  the  complex 
problems  of  the  last.    The  long  and  difficult  preliminary  elaboration 
must  disgust  and  deter  vulgar  and  ill-prepared  minds,  and  subdue 
the  most  rebellious.     This  consideration,  if  there  were  no  other, 
would  prove  the  eminently  organic  tendency  of  the  new  political 
philosophy. 

its  effect  on  ^  navc  dwelt  on  this  influence  of  the  Positive  philos- 

progr.^  ophy,  in  favor  of  Order,  because  it  is  that  which  is,  as 

yet,  least  recognised,  while  the  retrograde  and  stationary  schools 
continue  to  found  their  claims  upon  that  very  point.  There  is  less 
mistake  about  its  favorable  influence  on  Progress.  In  all  its  appli 
cations,  the  positive  spirit  is  directly  progressive  ;  its  express  office 
being  to  increase  our  knowledge,  and  perfect  the  connection  of  its  i 
parts.  Even  the  illustrations  of  progression  are,  at  the  present 
day,  derived  from  the  positive  sciences.  Whatever  rational  idea 
of  social  progress  (that  is,  of  continuous  development,  with  a  steady 


ITS   EFFECT   ON   PROGRESS.  435 

tendency  toward  a  determinate  end)  anywhere  exists,  should,  a?  wo 
shall  hereafter  see,  be  attributed  to  the  unperceived  influence  of  the 
positive  philosophy,  in  disengaging  this  great  notion  from  its  pres 
ent  vague  and  fluctuating  state  by  clearly  assigning  the  aim  and  the 
general  course  of  progress.  Though  Christianity  certainly  bore  a 
part  in  originating  the  sentiment  of  social  progress  by  proclaiming 
the  superiority  of  the  new  law  to  the  old,  it  is  evident  that  the 
theological  polity,  proceeding  upon  an  immutable  type,  which  was 
realized  only  in  the  past,  must  have  become  radically  incompatible 
with  ideas  of  continuous  progression,  and  manifests,  on  the  con 
trary,  a  thoroughly  retrograde  character.  The  metaphysical  polity, 
in  its  dogmatic  aspect,  has  the  same  incompatibility,  though  the 
feeble  connection  of  its  doctrines  renders  it  more  accessible  to  the 
spirit  of  our  time.  Indeed,  it  was  only  after  the  decline  of  that 
school  had  begun,  that  ideas  of  progress  took  any  general  posses 
sion  of  the  public  mind.  Thus  the  progressive,  as  well  as  the 
organic  instinct,  is  to  be  developed  by  the  positive  philosophy  alone. 
The  only  idea  of  progress  which  is  really  proper  to  the  'revolu 
tionary  philosophy,  is  that  of  the  continuous  extension  of  liberty : 
that  is,  in  positive  terms,  the  gradual  expansion  of  human  powers. 
Now,  even  in  the  restricted  and  negative  sense  in  which  this  is 
true — that  of  the  perpetual  diminution  of  obstacles — the  positive 
philosophy  is  incontestably  superior  ;  for  true  liberty  is  nothing  else 
than  a  rational  submission  to  the  preponderance  of  the  laws  of 
nature,  in  release  from  all  arbitrary. personal  dictation.  Decisions 
of  sovereign  assemblies  have  been  called  laws  by  the  metaphysical 
polity,  and  have  been  fictitiously  regarded  as  a  manifestation  of 
popular  will.  But  no  such  homage  paid  to  constitutional  entities 
can  disguise  the  arbitrary  tendency  which  marks  all  the  philoso 
phies  but  the  positive.  The  arbitrary  can  never  be  excluded  while 
political  phenomena  are  referred  to  Will,  divine  or  human,  instead 
of  being  connected  with  invariable  natural  laws ;  and  lilTerty  will 
remain  illusory  and  precarious,  notwithstanding  all  constitutional 
artifices,  and  whatever  be  the  will  to  which  we  pay  our  daily  obe 
dience.  By  substituting  the  empire  of  genuine  convictions  for  that 
of  arbitrary  will,  the  positive  philosophy  will  put  an  end  to  the 
absolute  liberty  of  the  revolutionary  school — the  license  of  running 
from  one  extravagance  to  another — and,  by  establishing  social  prin 
ciples,  will  meet  the  need  at  once  of  order  and  of  progress.  The 
special  office  of  the  revolutionary  philosophy,  that  of  extinguishing 
all  but  the  historical  existence  of  the  ancient  political  system,  is 
virtually  committed  to  the  positive  principle ;  and,  in  fact,  the 
power  exercised  by  the  critical  doctrine  in  this  direction  has  been 
owing  to  its  serving  the  purpose  of  a  provisional  organ  to  the  posi 
tive  philosophy.  In  other  sciences,  the  critical  action,  however 
energetic,  is  only  a  collateral  consequence  of  its  organic  develop 
ment  ;  and  the  organic  development  which  is  fatal  to  the  old  theo 
logical  system,  involves  in  the  same  condemnation  the  metaphysical 
spirit,  which  is  even  the  less  logical  of  the  two.  The  most  serious 


436  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

Difficulty  of  contemporary  politics  is  the  condition  of  tlie  lower 
classes ;  and  in  this  case  the  positive  philosophy  affords  practical 
amelioration  most  favorable  to  progress.  The  revolutionary  polity 
opened  only  an  insurrectionary  issue  to  this  difficulty,  and  merely 
shifted  without  solving  the  question.  The  question  is  not  settled 
by  opening  a  way  to  popular  ambition,  the  gratification  of  which 
must  be  confined  to  a  few  (probably  deserters  from  their  class), 
and  can  do  nothing  to  soothe  the  murmurs  of  the  multitude.  The 
general  lot  is  even  aggravated  by  the  excitement  of  unreasonable 
hopes,  and  by  the  elevation  of  a  few  by  the  chances  of  the  political 
game.  As  it  is  the  inevitable  lot  of  the  majority  of  men  to  live  on 
the  more  or  less  precarious  fruits  of  daily  labor,  the  great  social 
problem  is  to  ameliorate  the  condition  of  this  majority,  without 
destroying  its  classification,  and  disturbing  the  general  economy  : 
and  this  is  the  function  of  the  positive  polity,  regarded  as  regu 
lating  the  final  classification  of  modern  society.  We  shall  have 
occasion  to  see  hereafter  that  the  mental  reorganization,  by  habitu 
ally  interposing  a  common  moral  authority  between  the  working 
classes  and  the  leaders  of  society,  will  offer  the  only  regular  basis 
«f  a  pacific  and  equitable  reconciliation  of  their  chief  conflicts, 
nearly  abandoned  in  the  present  day  to  the  savage  discipline  of  a 
purely  material  antagonism. 

In  this  brief  sketch  of  the  prominent  characteristics  of  the  posi 
tive  polity,  we  have  seen  that,  notwithstanding  its  severe  estimate  of 
the  different  existing  parties,  it  commands  access  to  the  spirit  of 
each  by  proving  itself  adapted  to  fulfil  the  aims  which  each  has 
pursued  too  exclusively.  It  can  also  turn  to  the  profit  of  its  grad 
ual  ascendency  all  the  important  incidents  of  existing  society  which 
it  could  not  intercept.  Whether  in  its  hour  of  exultation,  the  one 
school  manifests  its  insufficiency ;  or  whether,  in  the  despair  of 
failure,  the  other  shows  a  disposition  to  welcome  new  means  of 
political  action ;  or  whether,  again,  a  kind  of  universal  torpor 
exhibits  in  its  nakedness  the  aggregate  of  social  needs,  the  new 
philosophy  can  always  lay  hold  of  a  certain  general  issue  to  intro 
duce,  by  a  daily  application,  its  fundamental  instruction.  In  doing 
this,  however,  we  must,  it  seems  to  me,  lay  aside  all  hope  of  a  real 
conversion  of  the  retrograde  school.  Setting  aside  some  happy 
individual  anomalies,  such  as  always  exist,  and  may  become  more 
frequent,  it  remains  indisputable  that  there  is  such  an  antipathy  in 
regard  to  social  questions,  between  the  theological  and  the  positive 
philosophies,  that  the  one  can  never  estimate  the  other,  and  must 
disappear  before  it,  without  being  able  to  undergo  any  radical 
modification  of  its  present  form.  It  is,  in  fact,  not  Order  that  the 
ancient  regime  aims  at,  but  only  its  own  preconception  of  a  unique 
order,  connected  with  its  habits  of  mind  and  special  interests,  out 
side  of  which  everything  appears  disorderly,  and  therefore  indif 
ferent.  In  the  midst  of  its  pretended  devotion  to  general  order, 
the  retrograde  school  has  often  betrayed  its  tendency  to  care  for 
the  means  more  than  the  end.  It  is  through  the  stationary  school, 


ANARCHICAL  TENDENCIES   OF  THE  SCIENTIFIC   CLASS.  437 

whose  love  of  order  is  at  least  more  impartial,  if  not  more  disinte- 
^ested,  that  the  positive  polity  must  obtain  the  access  which  it 
could  nt)t  hope  for  from  the  retrograde  school.     The  metaphysical 
fictions  of  the  parliamentary  or  constitutional  philosophy  may  have 
diverted  the  mind  of  the  stationary  school  from  the  true  issue  ;  but 
they  have  not  attained  such  an  ascendency  among  the  nations  of 
the  European  continent  as  to  render  them  deaf  to  the  rational  voice 
of  the  new  philosophy,  when  it  appeals  to  a  school  so  openly  dis 
posed  as  is  the  stationary  party  to  establish  permanent  order,  on 
whatever  principles,  in  modern  society.     Some  useful  action  may 
therefore  be  hoped  for  through  this  medium.     Nevertheless,  I  avow 
that  it  is  on  the  revolutionary  school  alone  that,  in  my  opinion,  we 
can  expect  that  the  positive  polity  can  exercise  a  predominant 
influence,  because  this  school  is  the  only  one  that  is  always  open  to 
new  action  on  behalf  of  progress.     All  its  indispensable  provisional 
doctrines  will  be  absorbed  by  the  new  philosophy,  while  all  its 
anarchical  tendencies  will  be  extinguished.     There  will  be  more 
explosions  of  revolutionary  doctrine,  as  long  as  there  are  any  re 
mains  of  the  retrograde  system ;  for  the  natural  course  of  events 
does  not  wait  for  our  S!OAV  philosophical  preparation.     "Whether  in 
virtue  of  our  intellectual  condition,  or  of  faults  committed  by  exist 
ing  governments,  such  outbreaks  will  occur ;  and  perhaps  they  may 
be  necessary  to  the  uprooting  of  all  hope  of  reconstructing  social 
order  on  the  old  basis  ;  but  the  positive  philosophy  will  have  fore 
seen  such  conflicts,  and  will  take  no  part  in  them,  further  than 
to  make  use  of  the  instruction  that  they  afford.     It  will  not  inter 
fere  with  the  last  operations  of  the  revolutionary  preponderance — 
knowing  that  they  are  the  last.     Nor  will  it  paralyse  so  important 
a  general  disposition  as  that  which  constitutes  the  critical  spirit, 
properly  so  called.     Ity  subordinating  it  for  ever  to  the  organic 
spirit,  it  will  open  to  it  broad  political  aims ;  it  will  afford  it  em 
ployment  in  destroying  all  metaphysical  and  theological  interfe 
rence,  using  for  this  end  the  satirical  faculties  which  produced 
nothing  in  the  last  century,  but  which  may  be  of  a  secondary  value 
in  influencing  the  development  of  the  political  character  that  will 
be  finally  assigned  to  each  school.     On  the  whole,  we  may  hope 
that  the  positive  philosophy  will  find  grounds  of  support  among  the 
most  advanced  sections  of  the  revolutionary  school ;  and,  whatever 
may  be  the  hopes  of  that  school  from  different  political  parties,  it 
will  be  unable  to  dispense  witli  the  scientific  superiority  of  the  posi 
tive  doctrine,  which  is  the  certain  cause  and  guarantee  of  its  gradual 
ascendency. 

It  might  have  been  hoped  that  the  renovation  we  are 

.     .       °.  ITT  1  i  i          'iji.il  *       AnnrchiCHi  tend- 

anticipating  would  have  been  largely  aided  by  tne  sci-  em-i^s  of  these* 
entific  class  of  society,  as  that  which  must  be  most  fa-  e 
miliar  with  positive  science.-  But  it  is  not  so.  At  present,  the 
anarchical  tendencies  of  that  class  appear  to  be  as  strong  as  any. 
The  indifference  of  scientific  men  to  the  most  interesting  and  most 
urgent  of  all  classes  of  problems  may  be  partly  accounted  for  by 


138  POSITIVE  PHILOSOPHY. 

their  deep  intellectual  disgust  at  the  irrational  character  of  the 
social  doctrines  of  their  day ;  but  there  are  other  reasons,  even  less 
honorable  than  this.  They  are  themselves  defective  in  scientific 
discipline.  They  abhor  generalities,  and  have  a  systematic  predi 
lection  for  specialities.  Under  the  idea  of  an  organization  of  labor, 
they  restrict  their  several  pursuits  within  the  narrowest  bounds, 
without  providing  for  the  investigation  of  general  relations ;  and 
thus,  science  becomes  a  pastime,  grounded  on  no  adequate  prepara 
tion.  It  is  not  wonderful  then  that  they  have  no  interest  in  the 
entire  generality  which  is  the  indispensable  attribute  of  any  phi 
losophy  that  aspires  to  the  moral  government  of  mankind.  Daily 
experience  shows  that,  when  learned  bodies  are  brought  into  junc 
tion,  for  any  political  purpose,  with  sensible  men  who  know  nothing 
of  science,  but  are  accustomed  to  general  views,  the  superiority 
rests  with  the  latter,  even  in  regard  to  matters  which  particularly 
concern  the  scientific  class.  As  long  as  this  is  the  case,  the  sci 
entific  class  decrees  its  own  political  subordination.  Their  social 
sentiment  is  on  a  par  with  their  ideas ;  and  their  egotism  is  aggra 
vated  by  their  devotion  to  specialities,  when  it  ought  to  be  subdued 
by  a  mastery  of  positive  science ;  and  would  be  so,  if  they  could 
admit  its  general  ideas.  This  is  no  fault  of  individuals  among 
them.  It  is  imputable  to  the  defective  scientific  education  of  our 
time ;  and  all  that  men  of  science  are  censurable  for  is  their 
dogmatic  denial  of  the  need  of  a  better.  We  must,  however, 
abandon  all  hope  of  their  co-operation  in  extending  the  positive 
method  to  the  study  of  social  phenomena.  If  we  may  anticipate 
anything  in  thai  direction,  it  must  be  from  a  rising  generation  for 
whom  a  more  adequate  training  must  be  provided,  and  who  will  be 
led  by  a  really  scientific  education  beyond  the  special  and  isolated 
studies  to  which  they  now  conceive  themselves  to  be  destined,  and 
which  constitute  at  present  their  only  idea  of  scientific  pursuit. 

I  have  now  presented  a  view  of  the  chief  points  of 
support  which  the  present  state  of  the  social  world 
affords  to  the  renovating  influence  of  the  new  political  philosophy. 
This  introduction  may  appear  long ;  but  it  will  abridge  my  future 
labor  by  furnishing  my  readers  with  a  kind  of  rational  programme 
of  the  conditions  of  the  subject.  Yet  more,  it  indicates  clearly 
what  is  apt  to  escape  the  notice  of  minds  habituated  to  the  superfi:- 
,  cial  and  irrational  treatment  of  social  questions, — the  complete 
political  efficacy  of  the  positive  philosophy.  The  high  practical 
utility  of  the  theory  I  am  about  to  offer  can  not  be  questioned  by  the 
haughtiest  politician  when  it  has  once  been  demonstrated  that  the 
deepest  want  of  modern  society  is,  in  its  nature,  eminently  theoreti 
cal,  and  that,  consequently,  an  intellectual,  and  then  a  moral  re 
organization  must  precede  and  direct  the  political. — This  mutual 
relation  being  established,  with  a  care  proportionate  to  its  impor 
tance,  we  must  now  return, — not  again  to  quit  it, — to  the  strictly 
scientific  point  of  view  of  this  work,  and  pursue  the  study  of  the 
phenomena  of  social  physics  in  a  disposition  of  mind  as  purely 


HISTORY   OF   SOCIAL  SCIENCE.  439 

speculative  as  that  in  which  we  surveyed  the  other  fundamental 
sciences,  with  no  other  intellectual  ambition  than  to  discover  the 
natural  laws  of  a  final  order  of  phenomena,  remarkable  in  the  ex 
treme,  and  never  before  examined  in  this  way. 

Before  proceeding,  however,  to  this  direct  examination,  I  pro 
pose  to  consider,  briefly,  the  principal  philosophical  attempts  to 
constitute  social  sciencf ;  as  a  general  estimate  of  this  kind  will 
tend  to  illustrate  the  nature  and  spirit  of  this  last  great  department 
of  positive  philosophy. 


CHAPTER  II. 

PRINCIPAL   PHILOSOPHICAL   ATTEMPTS   TO   CONSTITUTE   A  SOCIAL 

SYSTEM. 

WE  have  seen  that  the  complex  and  special  nature  Hi*tory  of  so- 
of  social  phenomena  is  the  chief  reason  why  the  study  cial  sci-uce. 
has  remain  imperfect  to  the  last ;  it  being  impossible  to  analyze 
them  till  the  simpler  departments  of  science  were  understood,  and 
till  the  great  discovery  of  cerebral  physiology  had  opened  a  rational 
access  to  their  examination.  To  this  main  consideration  we  must 
now  add  another,  which  explains  more  specially  why  it  has  never 
till  now  been  possible  to  establish  social  science  on  a  positive  basis. 
This  consideration  is,  that  we  have  not  till  now  been  in  possession 
of  a  range  of  facts  wide  enough  to  disclose  the  natural  laws  of  so 
cial  phenomena. 

The  first  rise  of  speculative  doctrine  has  always,  in  all  sciences, 
taken  place  from  the  theological  method,  as  I  have  shown.  In  the 
case  of  the  anterior  sciences,  this  did  not  preclude  the  formation 
of  a  positive  theory,  when  once  there  had  been  a  sufficient  perpetuity 
of  phenomena.  The  materials  were  ready  before  there  were  ob 
servers  qualified  to  make  a  scientific  use  of  them.  But,  even  if 
observers  had  been  ready,  the  phenomena  of  social  life  were  not 
ample  and  various  enough  in  early  days  to  admit  of  their  philo 
sophical  analysis.  Many  and  profound  modifications  of  the  primitive 
civilization  were  necessary  to  afford  a  sufficient  basis  for  experi 
ment.  We  shall  see  hereafter  how  indispensable  was  the  operation 
of  the  theological  philosophy  in  directing  the  earliest  progress  of 
the  human  mind  and  of  society.  Our  present  business  is  to  notice 
the  obstacles  which  it  presented  to  the  formation  of  a  true  social 
science.  It  was  not,  in  fact,  till  modern  political  revolutions,  and 
especially  the  French,  had  proved  the  insufficiency  of  the  old  politi 
cal  system  for  the  social  needs  of  the  age  that  the  great  idea  of 
Progress  could  acquire  sufficient  firmness,  distinctness  and  general 
ity,  to  serve  a  scientific  purpose.  The  direction  of  the  social 


440  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

movement  was  not  determined  ;  and  social  speculation  was  embar 
r>assed  by  fanciful  notions  of  oscillating  or  circular  movements,  such 
as  even  now  cause  hesitation  in  able  but  ill-prepared  minds  as  to 
the  real  nature  of  human  progression.  Till  it  is  known  in  what  this 
progression  consists,  the  fact  itself  may  be  disputed :  since,  from 
such  a  point  of  view,  humanity  may  appear  to  be  doomed  to  an. 
arbitrary  succession  of  identical  phases,  without  ever  experiencing 
a  new  transformation,  gradually  directed  toward  an  end  determined 
by  the  whole  constitution  of  human  nature. 

Thus  all  idea  of  social  progress  was  interdicted  to  the  philos 
ophers  of  antiquity,  for  want  of  materials  of  political  observation. 
The  most  eminent  and  sagacious  of  them  were  subject  to  the  com 
mon  tendency  to  suppose  the  contemporary  state  of  things  inferior 
to  that  of  former  times.  This  supposition  was  the  more  natural 
and  legitimate  because  the  philosophical  works  which  contained 
this  view  coincided,  as  to  date,  with  the  decline  of  the  Greek  and 
Roman  regime.  This  decline,  which,  in  relation  to  the  whole  of 
human  history,  was  in  fact  progress,  could  not  appeal1  so  to  the 
ancients,  who  did  not  anticipate  what  was  to  come.  I  have  before 
intimated  that  the  first  dawning  sense  of  human  progression  was  in 
spired  by  Christianity,  which,  by  proclaiming  the  superiority  of  the 
law  of  Jesus  to  that  of  Moses,  gave  form  to  the  idea  of  a  more 
perfect  state  replacing  a  less  perfect,  which  had  been  necessary  as 
a  preparation.  Though  Catholicism*  was,  in  this,  simply  the  organ, 
of  expression  of  human  reason,  the  service  it  thus  rendered  entitles 
it  not  the  less,  as  all  true  philosophers  will  agree,  to  our  eternal 
gratitude.  But,  apart  from  the  mischief  of  the  mysticism  and 
vague  obscurity  which  belong  to  all  applications  of  the  theological 
method,  such  a  beginning  could  not  possibly  suggest  any  scientific 
view  of  social  progression :  for  any  such  progression  was  barred 
at  once  by  the  claim  of  Christianity  to  be  the  ultimate  stag<5  at 
which  the  human  mind  must  stop.  The  social  efficacy  of  the  theo 
logical  philosophy  is  now  exhausted,  and  it  has  become  therefore 
retrograde,  as  we  have  seen ;  but  the  condition  of  continuity  is  an 
indispensable  element  in  the  conception  of  progress  ;  an  idea  which 
would  have  no  power  to  guide  social  speculation  if  it  represented 
progress  as  limited  by  its  nature  to  a  determinate  condition,  attained 
long  ago. 

It  is  thus  evident  that  the  conception  of  progress  belongs  exclu 
sively  to  the  positive  philosophy.  This  philosophy  alone  can 
indicate  the  final  term  which  human  nature  will  be  for  ever  ap 
proaching  and  never  attaining ;  and  it  alone  can  prescribe  the 
general  course  of  this  gradual  development.  Accordingly,  the 
only  rational  ideas  of  continuous  advance  are  of  modern  origin, 

*  This  great  idea  belongs  essentially  to  Catholicism,  from  which  Protestantism  derived 
it  in  an  imperfect  and  corrupt  manner, — not  only  by  recurring  irrationally  to  the  period 
of  the  primitive  Church,  but  also  by  offering-  for  popular  guidance  the  most  barbarous 
and  dangerous  part  of  the  Scriptures — that  which  relates  to  Hebrew  antiquity.  Moham 
medanism  pursued  the  same  practice,  arid  thus  instituted  a  mere  imitation  of  Judaic 
barbarism,  without  introducing  any  real  amelioration. 


ARISTOTLE.  441 

and  relate  especially  to  the  expansion  of  the  positive  sciences  which 
gave  birth  to  them.     It  may  even  be  worth  observing  that  the  first 
satisfactory  view  of  general  progression  was  proposed  by  a  philos 
opher  whose  genius  was  essentially  mathematical ;  and  therefore 
conversant   with  the  simplest  form  of  the  scientific  spirit.     What 
ever  may  be  the  value  of  this  observation,  it  is  certain  that  Pascal 
was  animated  by  a  sense  of  the  progress  of  the  sciences  when  he 
uttered  the  immortal  aphorism :   "  The  entire  succession  of  men, 
through  the  whole  course  of  ages,  must  be  regarded  as  one  man, 
always  living  and  incessantly  learning."    Whatever  may  have  been 
the  actual  effect  of  this  first  ray  of  light,  it  must  be  admitted  that 
the  idea  of  continuous  progress  had  no  scientific  consistency,  or 
public  regard,  till  after  the  memorable  controversy,  at  the  begin 
ning  of  the  last  century,  about  a  general  comparison  of  the  an 
cients  and  moderns.     In  my  view,  that  solemn  discussion  consti 
tutes  a  ripe  event  in  the  history  of  the  human  mind,  which  thus, 
for  the  first  time,  declared  that  it  had  made  an  irreversible  advance. 
It  is  needless  to  point  out  that  the  leaders  of  this  great  philosophi 
cal  movement  derived  all  the  force  of  their  arguments  from  the 
scientific  spirit:  but  it  is  remarkable  that  their  most  illustrious 
adversaries  committed   the   inconsistency  of  declaring  that  they 
preferred  the  philosophy  of  Descartes  to  that  which  preceded  it. — 
From  this  scientific  origin  the  conception  spread  more  and  more  in 
a  political  direction,  till,  at  length,  the  French  revolution  manifested 
the  tendency  of  humanity  toward  a  political  system,  indeterminate 
enough,  but  radically  different  from  the  old  system.     This  was  the 
negative  view  of  social  progress  ;  ineffectual  in  itself,  but  necessary 
as  a  preparation  for  the  advent  of  the  positive  philosophy,  when  it 
should  have  made  its  induction  from  social  phenomena,  and  ascer 
tained  their  laws. 

Having  thus  seen  how  impossible  was  the  formation  of  social 
science  in  ancient  times,  we  are  in  a  condition  to  appreciate  the 
attempts  which  were  here  and  there  prematurely  made.  The  fore 
going  analysis  shows  that  the  political  conditions  of  the  subject  are, 
generally,  precisely  coincident  with  the  scientific,  so  as  to  retard 
by  their  competition  the  possibility  of  establishing  social  science  on 
a  positive  basis.  This  obstacle  has  existed  even  up  to  our  own 
generation,  who  can  only  make  a  mere  beginning  in  seeking  in  the 
past  a  basis  for  social  science,  in  virtue  of  their  experience  of  a 
revolutionary  period,  and  of  their  opening  perception  of  the  posi 
tive  principle,  as  they  see  it  established  in  the  other  departments 
of  human  knowledge,  including  that  of  intellectual  and  moral  phe 
nomena.  It  would  be  waste  of  time,  and  a  departure  from  my 
object,  to  analyze  fully  the  attempts  of  ancient  philosophers  to  form 
a  political  science  which  was  thus  clearly  impracticable  in  their 
day ;  and  I  shall  therefore  merely  point  out  the  essential  vice  of 
each  speculation,  thereby  justifying  the  judgment  that  we  have  just 
passed  by  anticipation,  and  disclosing  the  true  nature  of  an  enter 
prise  which  remains  to  be  begun. 


442  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

A  retort  .»9  The  name  of  Aristotle  first  presents  itself,  his  raem- 

'•  i»oi  tic,."  orable  "  Politics"  being  one  of  the  finest  productions 
of  antiquity,  and  furnishing  the  general  type  of  most  of  the  works 
on  that  subject  that  have  followed.  This  treatise  could  not  possi 
bly  disclose  any  sense  of  the  progressive  tendencies  of  humanity, 
nor  the  slightest  glimpse  of  the  natural  laws  of  civilization ;  and  it 
was  necessarily  occupied  by  metaphysical  discussions  of  the  prin 
ciple  and  form  of  government :  but  it  is  truly  marvellous  that  any 
mind  should  have  produced  a  work  so  advanced,  and  even  nearer 
to  a  positive  view  than  his  other  works,  at  a  time  when  political 
observation  was  restricted  to  a  uniform  and  preliminary  social  state, 
and  when  the  nascent  positive  spirit  lived  feebly  in  geometry  alone. 
The  analysis  by  which  he  refuted  the  dangerous  fancies  of  Plato  and 
his  imitators  about  community  of  property  evidences  a  rectitude, 
a  sagacity,  and  a  strength,  which,  in  their  application  to  such  sub 
jects,  have  been  rarely  equalled,  and  never  surpassed.  Thus  much 
I  have  said,  in  the  way  of  homage  to  the  first  manifestation  of 
human  genius  on  the  great  subject  of  government,  notwithstanding 
the  evident  influence  that  it  has  exercised  upon  philosophical  medi 
tation,  from  its  own  day  to  this. 

The  works  which  succeeded  need  not  detain  us.  They  were 
merely  an  accumulation  of  fresh  materials,  classified  by  the  type 
that  Aristotle  had  furnished.  The  next  period  worth  notice  is  that 
in  which  the  preponderance  of  the  positive  spirit  in  the  study  of 
phenomena  caused  the  first  clear  comprehension  of  the  meaning  of 
general  laws,  and  in  which  the  idea  of  human  progress  began  to 
assume  some  consistency ;  and,  to  find  these  two  conditions  in  con 
currence,  we  can  hardly  go  further  back  than  the  middle  of  the  last 
centuiy.  The  first  and  most  important  series  of  works 
which  then  presents  itself  is  that  of  Montesquieu,  first, 
in  his  treatise  on  the  "  Greatness  and  Decline  of  the  Romans,"  and 
afterward  in  his  "  Spirit  of  Laws."  The  great  strength  of  this 
memorable  work  appears  to  me  to  lie  in  its  tendency  to  regard 
political  phenomena  as  subject  to  invariable  laws,  like  all  othei 
phenomena.  This  is  manifested  at  the  very  outset,  in  the  prelimi 
nary  chapter,  in  which,  for  the  first  time  in  the  history  of  the  humai 
mind,  the  general  idea  of  law  is  directly  defined,  in  relation  to  all , 
even  to  political  subjects,  in  the  same  sense  in  which  it  is  applied 
in  the  simplest  positive  investigations.  The  progress  of  science 
which  had  been  effected  by  the  labors  of  Descartes,  Galileo,  and 
Kepler,  a  century  before,  had  rendered  the  most  advanced  minds 
familiar  with  an  incomplete  notion  of  progress.  Montesquieu's 
conception  was  a  generalization  of  this  incomplete  notion:  and, 
instead  of  denying  originality  to  so  eminent  a  service,  we  may  well 
be  amazed  that  such  a  conception  should  be  offered,  before  the 
positive  method  had  extended  beyond  the  simplest  natural  phe 
nomena, — being  scarcely  admitted  into  the  department  of  chemistry, 
and  not  yet  heard  of  in  the  study  of  living  bodies.  And,  in  the 
other  view,  a  man  must  have  been  in  advance  of  his  time,  who  could 


MONTESQUIEU.  443 

conceive  of  natural  laws  as  the  basis  of  social  speculation  and 
action,  while  all  other  able  men  were  talking  about  the  absolute 
and  indefinite  power  of  legislators,  when  armed  with  due  authority, 
to  modify  at  will  the  social  state.  The  very  qualities,  howeve"r' 
which  give  its  pre-eminence  to  Montesquieu's  work  prove  to  us  the 
impossibility  of  success  in  an  enterprise  so  premature  in  regard  to 
its  proposed  object,  the  very  conditions  of  which  were  still  imprac 
ticable.  The  project  of  the  work  is  not  fulfilled  in  its  course  ;  and, 
admirable  as  are  some  of  its  details,  it  falls  back,  like  all  others, 
upon  the  primitive  type  offered  by  Aristotle's  treatise.  We  find  no 
reference  of  social  phenomena  to  the  laws  whose  existence  was 
announced  at  the  outset ;  nor  any  scientific  selection  and  connec 
tion  of  facts.  The  general  nature  of  his  practical  conclusions 
seems  to  show  how  far  the  execution  of  his  work  was  from  corre 
sponding  with  his  original  intention ;  for  his  desultory  review  of 
the  whole  mass  of  social  subjects  ends  in  his  setting  up,  as  a  uni 
versal  political  type,  the  English  parliamentary  system,  the  insuf 
ficiency  of  which,  for  the  satisfaction  of  modern  social  requirements, 
was  not,  it  is  true,  so  conspicuous  in  his  day  as  it  is  now,  but  still 
discernible  enough,  as  we  shall  have  occasion  to  see.  It  was  hon 
orable  to  Montesquieu's  philosophical  character,  that  he  steered 
wide  of  the  metaphysical  Utopias  which  lay  in  his  way,  and  resorted 
rather  to  the  narrow  anchorage  at  which  he  rested ;  but  such  a 
resort,  so  narrow  and  so  barren,  proves  that  he  had  wandered  away 
from  the  course  announced  by  himself.  The  only  part  of  the  book 
which  bears  any  true  marks  of  sustained  positivity  is  that  in  which 
the  social  influence  of  permanent  local  causes — of  that  which,  in 
political  language,  we  may  call  climate — is  considered.  This  view, 
evidently  derived  from  Hippocrates,  manifests  a  tendency  to  attach 
observed  phenomena  to  forces  able  to  produce  them,  as  in  natural 
philosophy ;  but  the  aim  has  failed.  The  true  political  influence 
of  climate  is  misconceived,  and  usually  much  exaggerated,  through 
the  common  error  of  analyzing  a  mere  modification  before  the  main 
action  is  fully  understood ;  which  is  much  like  trying  to  determine 
planetary  perturbations  before  ascertaining  the  chief  gravitations. 
This  error  was  inevitable  under  Montesquieu's  necessary  ignorance 
of  the  great  social  laws,  while  he  was  bent  upon  introducing  the 
positive  spirit  into  the  domain  of  politics.  He  naturally  betook 
himself  to  the  only  class  of  social  speculations  which  seemed  fit  for 
his  purpose.  Pardonable  or  unavoidable  as  was  his  failure,  it  is  a 
new  evidence  of  the  vast  gap  which  lies  open  at  the  outset  of  the 
science.  Montesquieu  did  not  even  perceive,  any  more  than  others, 
the  fact  which  should  regulate  the  whole  political  theory  of  climate  ; 
— that  local  physical  causes,  very  powerful  in  the  early  days  of 
civilization,  lose  their  force  in  proportion  as  human  development 
admits  of  their  being  neutralized :  a  view  which  would  certainly 
have  occurred  to  Montesquieu  if  he  had  possessed  himself  of  the 
fundamental  notion  of  human  progression  before  he  treated  of  the 
political  theory  of  climate.  Thus,  this  great  philosopher  proposed 


444  POSITIVE  PHILOSOPHY. 

a  grand  enterprise  which  was  premature  in  two  senses,  and  in 
which  he  could  not  but  fail, — first,  by  bringing  social  phenomena 
under  the  operation  of  the  positive  spirit  before  it  had  been  intro 
duced  into  the  system  of  biological  science  ;  and  again,  in  proposing 
social  reorganization  during  a  period  marked  out  for  revolutionary 
action.  This  explains  why  a  mind  so  eminent  should  have  exer 
cised,  through  its  very  advancement,  an  immediate  influence  very 
inferior  to  that  of  a  mere  sophist,  like  Rousseau,  whose  intellectual 
state,  much  better  adapted  to  the  disposition  of  his  contemporaries, 
allowed  him  to  constitute  himself,  with  so  remarkable  a  success, 
.the  natural  organ  of  the  revolutionary  movement  of  the  time.  It 
is  by  our  posterity  that  Montesquieu  will  be  duly  estimated,  when 
the  extension  of  the  positive  philosophy  to  social  speculations  will 
disclose  the  high  value  of  the  precocious  attempts  which,  though 
doomed  to  failure,  yield  the  light  by  which  the  general  question 
must  be  laid  down. 

After  Montesquieu,  the  next  great  addition  to  Sociol- 

Condorcot.  ,     -,  .    •,     .      Xl         ,      '        T  •,  -.-.  -,     , 

ogy  (which  is  the  term  I  may  be  allowed  to  invent  to 
designate  Social  Physics)  was  made  by  Condorcet,  proceeding  on 
the  views  suggested  by  his  illustrious  friend  Turgot.  Turgot's  sug 
gestions  with  regard  to  the  theory  of  the  perfectability  of  human 
nature  were  doubtless  the  basis  of  Condorcet's  speculation  exhibited 
in  his  Historical  Sketch  of  the  Progress  of  the  Human  Mind,  in 
which  the  scientific  conception  of  the  social  progression  of  the  race 
was,  for  the  first  time,  clearly  and  directly  proposed,  with  a  distinct 
assertion  of  its  primary  importance.  The  strength  of  the  work  lies 
in  its  introduction,  in  which  Condorcet  exhibits  his  general  idea, 
and  proposes  his  philosophical  project  of  studying  the  radical  con 
nection  of  the  various  social  states  of  mankind.  These  few  immor 
tal  pages  leave  really  nothing  to  be  desired  in  regard  to  the  posi 
tion  of  the  sociological  question  at  large,  which  will,  in  my  opinion, 
rest,  through  all  future  time,  on  this  admirable  statement.  The 
execution  is  far  from  corresponding  with  the  greatness  of  the 
project ;  but  no  failure  in  the  carrying  out  can  impair  the  value  of 
the  design.  The  success  and  the  failure  may  both  be  easily 
accounted  for  by  a  consideration  of  the  scientific  and  political 
knowledge  of  the  time.  The  expansion  of  the  natural  sciences,  and 
especially  of  chemistry,  during  the  second  half  of  the  last  century, 
had  thoroughly  established  in  the  best  minds  of  the  period  the  idea 
of  positive  laws  ;  and  the  study  of  living  bodies,  in  the  departments 
of  anatomy  and  taxonomy,  if  not  of  physiology,  began  to  assume  a 
truly  scientific  character.  Condorcet's  mind  was  rationally  pre 
pared  by  mathematical  study,  under  the  direction  of  D'Alembert : 
by  his  philosophical  position  in  society,  he  had  all  the  advantage 
of  the  expansion  of  physico-chemical  science  then  taking  place ; 
and  of  the  labors  of  Haller,  Jussieu,  Linnaeus,  Bufifon,  and  Vicq- 
d'Azir  in  the  principal  departments  of  biological  knowledge ;  and 
it  was  natural  that  he  should  conceive  the  enterprise  of  carrying 
into  the  speculative  study  of  social  phenomena  the  same  positive 


CONDORCET.  445 

method  which,  from  the  time  of  Descartes,  had  been  regenerating 
the  entire  system  of  human  knowledge.  With  equal  advantages, 
and  his  higher  order  of  genius,  Montesquieu  would,  no  doubt,  have 
achieved  higher  results  than  he  has  left  us.  Still,  even  Condorcet's 
project  was  premature,  though  less  so  than  that  of  Montesquieu  ; 
for  a  great  deficiency  remained  in  the  imperfect  state  of  biological 
knowledge,  and  especially  in  the  exclusion  of  intellectual  and  moral 
phenomena  from  treatment  by  the  positive  method :  and  the  unfor 
tunate  Condorcet  did  not  live  to  see  them  assume  their  proper 
place.  In  their  absence,  he  lost  himself  in  wanderings  after  an  in 
definite  perfectibility,  and  chimerical  and  absurd  anticipations. 
Such  aberrations,  affecting  such  men,  are  a  lesson  to  us  as  to  the 
impossibility  of  unaided  reason  overleaping  the  intervals  which 
have  not  been  steadily  explored  in  the  gradual  advance  of  the  hu 
man  mind.  As  to  the  political  circumstances  of  the  time — the  idea 
of  social  progression  was  certainly  more  distinct  and  more  firm  in 
Condorcet' s  than  in  Montesquieu's  time  :  for  the  tendency  of  Soci 
ety  to  relinquish  the  ancient  social  system  was  becoming  evident, 
though  the  new  system  which  was  to  succeed  it  was  but  vaguely 
suspected,  even  where  it  was  not  wholly  misconceived.  The  evil 
influence  of  the  revolutionary  doctrine  is  singularly  exhibited  in 
Condorcet's  work,  in  the  form  of  an  inconsistency  which  must  strike 
every  reader.  The  human  race  is  there  represented  as  having 
attained  a  vast  degree  of  perfection  at  the  close  of  the  eighteenth 
century,  while  the  author  attributes  an  entirely  retrogressive  influ 
ence  to  almost  every  doctrine,  institution,  and  preponderant  power 
throughout  the  whole  past.  Whereas,  the  total  progress  accom 
plished  can  be  nothing  else  than  the  result  of  the  various  kinds  of 
partial  progress  realized  since  the  beginning  of  civilization,  in  vir 
tue  of  the  gradual  onward  course  of  human  nature.  Such  a  state 
of  things  as  Condorcet  describes  would  be  nothing  else  than  a  per 
petual  miracle ;  and  it  is  not  to  him,  therefore,  that  we  can  look  for 
any  disclosure  of  the  laws  of  human  development,  any  appreciation 
of  the  transitory  nature  of  the  revolutionary  philosophy,  or  any 
general  conception  of  the  future  of  society.  Here  again  we  recog 
nise  the  philosophical  superiority  of  Montesquieu,  who,  not  having 
Condorcet's  opportunities  of  estimating  the  revolutionary  spirit,  had 
been  able  to  free  his  mind  from  those  critical  prejudices  in  regard 
to  the  past  which  formed  the  views  of  all  around  him,  and  had  in 
jured  his  own  earlier  speculations.  This  brief  survey  of  the  labors 
of  these  great  men  shows  us  that  the  basis  of  true  social  science  can 
be  fixed  only  after  the  revolutionary  spirit  has  begun  to  decline ; 
and  thus  the  political,  as  well  as  the  scientific  indications  of  the 
subject  point  to  our  own  time  as  that  in  which  such  a  science  is  to 
be  founded.  Condorcet  gave  us  a  clear  exposition  of  the  nature  of 
the  enterprise ;  but  the  whole  accomplishment  yet  remains  to  be 
achieved. 

These  two  attempts  are  really  all  that  have  been  made  in  the 
right  road  to  social  science;   for  they  are  the  only  speculations 


446  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

which  have  been  based  on  the  aggregate  of  historical  facts.  I  shall 
have  occasion,  further  on,  to  notice  some  attempts  which  are  not 
worthy  to  rank  with  these,  and  which  merely  testify  to  the  existing 
need  of  social  science  by  showing  how  various  are  the  directions  in 
which  it  is  sought.  On  one  subject,  however,  I  shall  here  make  a 
few  observations,  in  order  to  illustrate  further  the  aim  and  spirit  of 
my  own  efforts  to  constitute  a  basis  for  social  science.  That  subject 
is  the  nature  and  object  of  what  is  called  Political  Economy. 
Politic  a  econo-  We  can  not  impute  to  political  economists  any  design 
™y-  to  establish  social  science  ;  for  it  is  the  express  asser 

tion  of  the  most  classical  among  them  that  their  subject  is  wholly 
distinct  from,  and  independent  of  general  political  science.  Yet, 
sincere  as  they  doubtless  are  in  their  dogma  of  isolation,  they  are 
no  less  sincerely  persuaded  that  they  have  applied  the  positive 
spirit  to  economical  science ;  and  they  perpetually  set  forth  their 
method  as  the  type  by  which  all  social  theories  will  be  finally  regen 
erated.  As  this  pretension  has  obtained  credit  enough  to  procure 
the  establishment  of  several  professorships  for  this  species  of  in 
struction,  I  find  myself  obliged  to  explain  why  it  is  that  I  can  not, 
as  would  be  very  desirable,  propose  to  carry  on  my  enterprise  from 
the  point  reached  by  these  philosophers,  but  must  begin  from  the 
beginning.  My  criticism  on  political  economy  in  this  place  is 
merely  for  the  purpose  of  showing  that  it  is  not  the  philosophical 
creation  that  we  want ;  and  I  must  refer  to  my  exposition  as  a 
whole  any  objectors  to  my  summary  estimate  of  political  economy. 
It  is  unfavorable  to  the  philosophical  pretensions  of  the  econo 
mists  that,  being  almost  invariably  lawyers  or  literary  men,  they 
have  had  no  opportunity  of  discipline  in  that  spirit  of  positive 
rationality  which  they  suppose  they  have  introduced  into  their 
researches.  Precluded  by  their  education  from  any  idea  of  scien 
tific  observation  of  even  the  smallest  phenomena,  from  any  notion 
of  natural  laws,  from  all  perception  of  what  demonstration  is,  they 
must  obviously  be  incapable  of  applying,  impromptu,  a  method  in 
which  they  have  had  no  practice  to  the  most  difficult  of  all  analyses. 
The  only  philosophical  preparation  that  they  can  show  is  a  set  of 
vague  precepts  of  general  logic,  susceptible  of  no  real  use ;  and 
thus,  their  conceptions  present  a  purely  metaphysical  character. 
There  is  one  great  exceptional  case  which  I  must  at  once  exempt 
from  this  criticism — that  of  the  illustrious  philosopher,  Adam 
Smith,  who  made  no  pretension  to  found  a  new  special  science,  but 
merely  proposed  (what  he  admirably  achieved)  to  illustrate  some 
leading  points  of  social  philosophy  by  luminous  analyses  relating  to 
the  division  of  employments,  the  function  of  money,  the  general 
action  of  banks,  etc.,  and  other  chief  portions  of  the  industrial  de 
velopments  of  the  human  race.  Though  involved,  like  all  his  con 
temporaries,  in  the  metaphysical  philosophy,  a  mind  of  such  quality 
as  his  could  not,  however  distinguished  in  the  metaphysical  school, 
be  blinded  by  its  illusions,  because  his  preparatory  studies  had 
impressed  him  with  a  sense  of  what  constitutes  a  true  scientific 


THE   POLITICAL   ECONOMISTS.  447 

method,  as  is  clearly  proved  by  the  valuable  sketches  of  the  philo 
sophical  history  of  the  sciences,  and  of  astronomy  in  particular, 
which  are  published  among  his  posthumous  works.  The  economists 
have  no  right  to  claim  Adam  Smith  as  their  authority  while  the 
whole  dogmatic  part  of  their  science  presents  a  merely  metaphysical 
character,  dressed  up  with  special  forms  and  a  list  of  scientific 
terms,  taken  bodily  from  former  philosophical  expositions, — as,  for 
instance,  from  the  theologico-metaphysical  writings  of  Spinoza. 
The  contemporary  history  of  this  so-called  science  confirms  this 
judgment  of  its  nature.  The  most  certain  signs  of  conceptions 
being  scientific  are  continuousness  and  fertility :  and  when  existing 
works,  instead  of  being  the  result  and  development  of  those  that 
have  gone  before,  have  a  character  as  personal  as  that  of  their 
authors,  and  bring  the  most  fundamental  ideas  into  question  ;  and 
when,  again,  the  dogmatic  constitution  provides  for  HO  real  and 
sustained  progress,  but  only  for  a  barren  reproduction  of  olft  con 
troversies,  it  is  clear  that  we  are  dealing  with  no  positive  doctrine 
whatever,  but  merely  with  theological  or  metaphysical  dissertations. 
And  this  is  the  spectacle  which  political  economy  has  presented  for 
half  a  century  past.  If  our  economists  were  really  the  scientific 
successors  of  Adam  Smith,  they  would  show  us  where  they  had 
carried  on  and  completed  their  master's  doctrine,  and  what  new 
discoveries  they  had  added  to  his  primitive  surveys ;  but  looking 
with  an  impartial  eye  upon  their  disputes  on  the  most  elementary 
ideas  of  value,  utility,  production,  etc.,  we  might  imagine  ourselves 
present  at  the  strangest  conferences  of  the  scholiasts  of  the  Middle 
Ages  about  the  attributes  of  their  metaphysical  entities ;  whicli 
indeed  economical  conceptions  resemble  more  and  more,  in  propor 
tion  as  they  are  dogmatized  and  refined  upon.  The  result  in  both 
•cases  is,  but  too  often,  the  perversion  of  the  valuable  indications 
of  popular  good  sense,  which  become  confused,  inapplicable,  and 
productive  only  of  idle  disputes  about  words.  All  intelligent  men, 
for  instance,  understand  what  is  meant  by  the  terms  product  and 
producer;  but,  from  the  time  that  economical  metaphysics  under 
took  to  define  them,  the  idea  of  production  has  become  through 
vicious  generalizations,  so  indeterminate,  that  conscientious  and 
clear  writers  are  obliged  to  use  circuitous  explanations  to  avoid  the 
use  of  terms  which  have  become  obscure  and  equivocal.  Such 
abuse  is  analogous  to  that  which  metaphysics  has  introduced  into 
the  study  of  the  human  understanding,  with  regard,  for  instance,  to 
the  general  ideas  of  analysis  and  synthesis  and  the  like.  The 
avowal  of  the  economists  that  their  science  is  isolated  from  that  of 
social  philosophy  in  general,  is  itself  a  sufficient  confirmation  of  rny 
judgment ;  for  it  is  a  universal  fact  in  social,  as  in  biological  sci 
ence,  that  all  the  various  general  aspects  of  the  subject  are  scien 
tifically  one,  and  rationally  inseparable,  so  that  they  can  not  be 
illustrated  but  by  each  other.  Thus,  the  economical  or  industrial 
analysis  of  society  can  not  be  effected  in  the  positive  method,  apart 
from  its  intellectual,  moral,  and  political  analysis,  past  and  present. 


448  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

And  thus  does  the  boasted  isolation  of  political  economy  testify  to 
its  being  grounded  on  a  metaphysical  basis. 

This  is  the  dogmatic  aspect  of  the  science.     But  it  would  be 
unjust  to  forget  that,  looking  at  this  doctrine  historically,  and  more 
with  a  political  than  a  scientific  view,  it  constitutes  a  final  essential 
part  of  the  system  of  critical  philosophy,  which  has  exercised  an 
indispensable,  though  transitory  influence  during  the  revolutionary 
period.     Political  Economy  has  borne  an  honorable  share  in  this 
vast  intellectual  conflict,  by  thoroughly  discrediting  the  industrial 
polity  of  the  Middle  Ages,  which  became  more  and  more  injurious, 
in  its  descent  to  our  time,  to  the  industry  which  it  had  once  pro 
tected.     Such  is  the  credit  due  to  Political  Economy.     Its  worst 
practical  fault  is  that,  like  the  other  portions  of  the  metaphysical 
philosophy,  it  systemizes  anarchy ;  and  the  danger  is  only  aggra 
vated  by  its  use  of  modern  scientific  forms.     It  has  not  been  satis 
fied  with  criticising,  in  much  too  absolute  a  way,  the  industrial 
polity  of  the  old  European  sovereignties,  without  which  the  indus 
trial  development  of  modern  times  could  never  have  taken  place  : 
it  goes  far  beyond  this  ;  it  sets  up  as  a  universal  dogma  the  absence 
Vof  all  regulating  intervention  whatever  as  the  best  means  of  pro 
moting  the  spontaneous  rise  of  society ;  so  that,  on  every  serious 
occasion,  this  doctrine  can  respond  to  urgent  practical  needs  only 
by  the  uniform  reproduction  of  this  systematic  negation.     Because 
it  perceives  a  natural  tendency  in  society  to  arrange  itself  in  a 
certain  order,  not  seeing  in  this  a  suggestion  of  an  order  to  be  pro 
moted  by  social  arrangements,  it  preaches  an  absence  of  regulation 
which,  if  carried  out  to  the  limit  of  the  principle,  would  lead  to  the 
methodical  abolition  of  all  government.     But  here  we  meet  the 
compensating  virtue  that  political  economy  insists  on  all  human 
I  interests  being  bound  up  together,  and  therefore  susceptible  of  a 
permanent  reconciliation.     Though  this  may  be  simply  the  expres 
sion  of  the  convictions  of  popular  good  sense,  philosophy  owes  a 
tribute  of  eternal  gratitude  to  the  economists  for  their  excellent 
service  in  extinguishing  the  disastrous  and  immoral  prejudice  which 
concluded  the  amelioration  of  the  condition  of  some  to  be  obtained 
by  the  deterioration  of  the  condition  of  somebody  else ;  and  that 
the  total  amount  of  wealth  was  always  the  same ;  which  is  as  much 
as  denying  industrial  development  altogether.      Notwithstanding 
this   great   service,  political  economy  has   dangerous   tendencies 
through  its  opposition  to  the  institution  of  all  industrial  discipline. 
As  each  serious  difficulty  arises,  in  the  course  of  industrial  devel 
opment,  political  economy  ignores  it.     In  the  great  question  of 
Machinery  this  is  remarkably  illustrated.     This  is  one  of  the  cases 
of  inconvenience  inherent  in  every  industrial  improvement,  from  its 
tendency  to  disturb,  more  or  less,  and  for  a  longer  or  shorter  time, 
the  mode  of  life  of  the  laboring  classes.     Instead  of  recognising  in 
the  urgent  remonstrances  called  forth  by  this  chasm  in  our  social 
order  one  of  the  most  eminent  and  pressing  occasions  for  the  appli 
cation  of  social  science,  our  economists  can  do  nothing  better  than 


GROWTH   OF   HISTORICAL   STUDY.  449 

repeat,  with  pitiless  pedantry,  their  barren  aphorism  of  absolute 
industrial  liberty.  Without  considering  that  all  human  questions, 
practically  regarded,  are  reducible  to  mere  questions  of  time,  they 
venture  to  reply  to  all  complaints  that,  in  the  long-run,  all  classes, 
and  especially  the  one  most  injured  on  the  existing  occasion,  will 
enjoy  a  real  and  permanent  amelioration ;  a  reply  which  will  be 
regarded  as  derisive,  as  long  as  man's  life  is  incapable  of  being 
indefinitely  lengthened.  Such  a  doctrine  publishes  its  own  weak 
ness  by  showing  its  want  of  relation  to  the  aggregate  of  our  practi 
cal  needs.  Would  the  copyists  who  were  thrown  out  of  employ 
ment  by  the  invention  of  printing  have  been  completely  consoled 
by  being  convinced  that,  in  the  next  generation,  there  would  be  an 
equal  number  of  persons  living  by  printing,  and  many  more  in  suc 
ceeding  centuries  ?  Yet  such  is  the  consolation  habitually  offered 
by  political  economy ;  and  if  there  were  no  other  evidence,  this 
inefficiency  would  prove  its  unfitness  to  direct,  as  it  proposes  to  do, 
the  industrial  expansion  of  modern  society.  And  thus  it  stands 
condemned,  as  to  its  scientific  pretensions,  and  in  spite  of  some 
important  services,  from  the  political  as  much  as  from  the  scientific 
point  of  view. 

The  temporary  predilection  of  men's  minds  for  political  economy 
is,  in  truth,  a  new  and  strong  illustration  of  the  instinctive  need 
which  prevails  to  subject  social  researches  to  positive  methods ; 
and  if  that  were  once  done,  the  interest  in  political  economy  would 
disappear.  Various  other  signs  of  the  times  testify  to  the  same 
disposition,  which  indeed  pervades  the  whole  action  of  our  intelli 
gences.  I  will  refer  to  only  one  among  the  multitude  of  those 
signs  ;  but  it  is  one  which  aids  in  bringing  about  the  satisfaction  of 
the  need.  I  mean  the  growing  inclination  for  historical  study,  and 
the  great  improvement  in  that  kind  of  research  within  two  centuries. 

Bossuet  was,  unquestionably,  the  first  who  proposed  Growthofhi8. 
to  survey,  from  a  lofty  point  of  view,  the  whole  of  the  torical  8  udy 
past  of  society.  We  can  not  adopt  his  explanations,  easily  derived 
from  theological  resources ;  but  the  spirit  of  universality,  so  thor 
oughly  appreciated,  and,  under  the  circumstances,  so  wonderfully 
sustained,  will  always  preserve  this  admirable  composition*  as  a 
model,  suggesting  the  true  result  of  historical  analysis ; — the  ra 
tional  co-ordination  of  the  great  series  of  human  events,  according 
to  a  single  design ;  which  must,  however,  be  more  genuine  and 
complete  than  that  of  Bossuet.  There  is  no  doubt  that  this  fine 
piece  of  instruction  has  contributed,  during  both  the  past  and  the 
present  century,  to  the  improvement  in  the  character  of  the  chief 
historical  compositions,  especially  in  France  and  England,  and 
afterward  in  Germany.  Still,  history  has  more  of  a  literary  and"1 
descriptive  than  of  a  scientific  character.  It  does  not  yet  establish 
a  rational  filiation  in  the  series  of  social  events,  so  as  to  admit  (as 
in  other  sciences,  and  allowing  for  its  greater  complexity)  of  any 
degree  of  systematic  prevision  of  their  future  succession.  Perhaps 

*  "  Discourse  on  Natural  History." 

29 


450  POSITIVE   PHILOSOPHY. 

the  imputation  of  rashness  cast  upon  the  mere  proposal  of  such  a 
treatment  of  history  is  the  strongest  confirmation  we  could  have  of 
its  present  unscientific  character :  for  such  prevision  is  everywhere 
else  admitted  to  be  the  ultimate  scientific  test.  Another  evidence 
exists  in  the  easy  credit  daily  obtained  by  misty  historical  theories 
which  explain  nothing,  and  which  testify  to  the  literary  and  meta 
physical  bias  under  which  history  is  studied,  by  minds  unacquainted 
with  the  great  scientific  movement  of  modern  times.  Again, 
another  evidence  is  the  dogmatic  separation  which  it  is  attempted 
to  keep  up  between  history  and  politics.  Still,  we  must  admit  the 
growing  taste  of  our  age  for  historical  labors  to  be  a  happy  symp 
tom  of  philosophical  regeneration,  however  the  inclination  may  be 
wasted  upon  superficial  and  misleading  works,  sometimes  written 
with  a  view  to  immediate  popularity  by  ministering  to  the  popular 
taste.  One  of  the  most  promising  incidents  of  the  time  is  the 
'ntroduction  into  the  highly  metaphysical  class  of  jurists  of  an  his 
torical  school  which  has  undertaken  to  connect,  during  every  period 
of  history,  the  whole  of  its  legislation  with  the  corresponding  state 
of  society. 

If  the  preceding  chapter  disclosed  the  destination  of  the  great 
philosophical  creation  of  which  I  am  treating,  the  present  exhibits 
its  necessity,  and  the  opportuneness  of  the  time.  Attempts  to  con 
stitute  a  science  of  society  would  not  have  been  so  obstinate,  nor 
pursued  in  ways  so  various,  if  an  instinctive  need  of  it  had  not  been 
deeply  felt.  At  the  same  time,  the  general  analysis  of  the  chief 
efforts  hitherto  made  explains  their  failure,  and  convinces  us  that 
the  whole  enterprise  remains  to  be  even  conceived  of  in  a  manner 
which  will  secure  its  accomplishment.  Nothing  now  prevents  our 
going  on  to  the  fulfilment  of  this  proposed  task,  by  entering,  in  the 
next  chapter,  on  the  study  of  the  method  in  Social  Physics.  We  have 
so  ascertained  and  cleared  our  ground,  by  first  taking  a  survey  of 
our  condition  from  a  political  point  of  view,  and  then  reviewing  the 
preparation  made,  that  we  are  at  full  liberty  to  follow  the  specula 
tive  development  that  will  prevail  throughout  the  rest  of  this  book, 
which  will  close  with  the  co-ordination  between  the  theory  and 
practice  of  Social  Physics. 


NOTE  '  The  foregoing  extract,  it  is  believed,  will  give  a  tolerable  idea  of  the  bear 
ing  of  the  Positive  Philosophy  on  Social  Science,  and  show  that  Sociology  is  a  Science, 
connected  with,  and  depending  on,  every  previous  one ;  thus  mathematically  demonstra 
ting  the  utter  futility  of  attempting,  henceforth  to  construct  the  Social  fabric  on  any 
other  basis  than  POSITIVISM. — Publisher. 


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